"It is a moot issue, meaning there is no weaponization fund. The weaponization fund is dead," Blanche told lawmakers on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Clayton, currently the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, is expected to succeed Bill Pulte, Trump's controversial acting director of national intelligence.

Stripe and private equity firm Advent International have reportedly made a joint $60.50-per-share offer to buy PayPal, valuing the payments company at more than $53 billion. The bid is said to represent a 28% premium to PayPal's latest closing price and is backed by roughly $50 billion in committed bank financing.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

⚽ All the latest news from a huge World Cup Wednesday
⚽ Spain reach final | Player guide | Golden Boot | Mail us

Over the next three hours – and when I’m subbed off thereafter – we’ll reflect on France 0-2 Spain, and look forward to England v Argentina. England v Argentina in the semi-finals of the World Cup, oh my complete and utter daze days.

Greetings one and all. Anyone got any plans for later?

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee for his confirmation hearing to lead the Justice Department in a permanent capacity.

Clayton, if confirmed, would replace Bill Pulte, and is facing senators for confirmation as the US’s top spy

Jay Clayton, the US attorney for the southern district of New York, refused to say that Joe Biden won the 2020 election during his Wednesday confirmation hearing to become the nation’s next intelligence chief.

Clayton opted instead to say that Biden was “certified” as president. Clayton also skirted questions about his previous election integrity claims and whether or not a White House official asked him to subpoena a group of New York Times journalists as part of an alleged national security investigation.

A three-week-old male harbor seal is in critical but stable condition and undergoing treatment at a Washington state wildlife center.

Trump’s nominee for attorney general – also his former personal defense lawyer – faces questions from senators as he attempts to take the top justice department role

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email

In his opening statement before senators today, Todd Blanche, said that he is “pleased to testify again today to tell everybody here that we are doing just that-we are keeping America safe”.

The nominee for attorney general, who has been leading the justice department in an acting capacity since Pam Bondi was fired in April.

Move comes after Trump rebuked his own homeland security department and insisted ICE maintain policy

The White House overturned a one-day old homeland security department (DHS) memo that said they would be halting traffic stops in the wake of recent stops that left two men killed in the space of a week on Wednesday morning, hours after Donald Trump insisted ICE keep making them.

Federal officers across the US had been told to temporarily stop pulling drivers over on Tuesday. That directive came after ICE agents fatally shot Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston on 7 July and Joan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in Maine on Monday. Both men were unarmed, neither was the intended target of the operation that killed him, and in both cases the agents involved wore no body camera to record what happened.

A deposit that large can generate hefty interest returns, but where you keep it plays a big role in what you earn.

Trump’s nominee will face tough questions over purging of career prosecutors, Epstein files and more

Todd Blanche is testifying in front of the Senate judiciary committee on Wednesday, as one of Donald Trump’s most loyal and powerful enforcers in government aims to be confirmed as the nation’s top law enforcement officer.

Few officials have been more instrumental in Trump’s crusade to transform the federal government in his second term than Blanche. Trump tapped Blanche, his former personal attorney, to serve as the deputy attorney general, the justice department’s No 2 position, at the start of his term, where he steered the department’s day-to-day work as career employees were purged over their connection to Trump investigations and the president oriented the department towards punishing political rivals and investigating debunked conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.

Second man on moon’s Duro Rocket pen, crucial to Apollo 11 return, reaches astronomical sum at Sotheby’s auction

The felt-tip pen Buzz Aldrin used to fix a broken circuit-breaker and escape from the moon in 1969 has sold at auction in New York for more than $850,000 (£630,000).

The dented silver plastic Duro Rocket pen – used by the second man on the moon to save Neil Armstrong and himself from being “stuck on the moon for ever” – had a sale price estimated by Sotheby’s at between $800,000 and $1.2m and went for $857,600 after being pursued by five bidders. The victor got the broken piece of circuit breaker, too, as part of the lot. Both came from Aldrin’s personal collection.

Members of the pro-Ukraine “coalition of the willing” this week reasserted their desire for such a force after a cessation of hostilities

Meanwhile, the Kremlin has rejected Lithuanian president’s warnings about a potential Russian attack on critical infrastructure (10:06), dismissing them as “horror stories” intended to “prepare public for further militarisation.”

Reuters reported that the Kremlin said these comments were merely a “pretext for further deployment of Nato military infrastructure to Baltic states.”

July 15, 2026 — The University of Michigan and Sandia National Laboratories have entered a five-year strategic partnership to expand cooperation in research and education between the university and the New Mexico-based national laboratory.

Both institutions will work to advance joint research projects under the partnership. They also will share specialized facilities, support researcher and student exchanges and pursue external funding from federal agencies and industry. Sandia is a federally funded research and development center operated for the U.S. Department of Energy.

U-M researchers have worked alongside scientists at Sandia for years, collaborating across engineering, computation, materials science and energy research. Recent projects include high-temperature computer memory for extreme environments, solar-panel coatings designed to shed snow in cold climates and organic glass scintillators for nuclear nonproliferation. U-M students have completed research residencies at Sandia through Department of Energy fellowship programs, and Sandia employees are pursuing advanced degrees at U-M.

“This is about moving faster from discovery to public value,” said Arthur Lupia, vice president for research and innovation. “The most important problems do not fit inside one discipline or one institution. This agreement gives our faculty and researchers a clearer way to work with Sandia scientists on technologies and challenges that matter to the country.”

Work will begin in AI for science and competitiveness, quantum information science, advanced manufacturing and workforce development. Those areas align U-M’s strengths in engineering, physics, computer science, robotics, high-performance computing and data-driven science with Sandia’s capabilities in quantum technologies, AI-enabled engineering, materials and advanced manufacturing. The partners plan to add or drop focus areas over time, based on where collaborations take hold.

The agreement also connects U-M to Sandia’s academic partnership programs and to facilities designed for collaboration with universities and industry, including the Center for Advanced Manufacturing and Innovation, known as CAMINO.

“Working with a public research university like Michigan brings perspectives and talent that strengthen the science behind our mission,” said Douglas Kothe, associate laboratories director for advanced science and technology and chief research officer at Sandia. “Together, we can build new research pathways in areas where speed, scale and scientific excellence all matter.”

The agreement outlines internships, research rotations and visiting appointments that would facilitate placing U-M undergraduate and graduate students in Sandia’s specialized facilities. Sandia staff will be able to join the mentorship teams of U-M graduate students, trainees and sponsor senior capstone projects on campus.

Sandia campus executives Joel Lash and Mike Lopez will coordinate the partnership on the laboratory’s side.

“I came to Sandia from Michigan myself, so I know firsthand what happens when university researchers and laboratory scientists work side by side,” said Lash, director of Sandia’s Material, Physical and Chemical Sciences Center, who earned his master’s degree and doctorate in nuclear science at U-M. “Our job now is to make that path easier to find, and to make sure the work that comes out of it serves the country.”

The two institutions plan to track progress through joint proposals and publications, student placements at Sandia, researcher exchanges, new research programs and external funding brought in by the collaboration.

The MOU does not create financial obligations for either institution. Each side will cover its own costs, and the partners will seek funding from government and industry sources to support joint projects.

“Everyone is asking how we move discoveries from the lab to the kitchen table faster,” said Monica Dus, director of U-M’s Office of National Laboratories. “The national labs have always been part of the answer, and today they matter more than ever. That is why we are building new alliances with the labs and with the extraordinary civil servants who help turn science into positive impact.”

Sandia National Laboratories is headquartered in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It is a multimission science and engineering research center operated by National Technology and Engineering Solutions of Sandia LLC for the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration.

Source: Eric Shaw, University of Michigan

The post University of Michigan and Sandia Launch Five-Year Research Partnership appeared first on HPCwire.

Kathryn Ruemmler welcomes closed-door interview and says she had no knowledge of ongoing criminal activity

lKathryn Ruemmler, who served as White House counsel under Barack Obama, is testifying on Wednesday morning before the House committee on oversight and reform about her ties to Jeffrey Epstein as part of the panel’s investigation into the convicted sex offender.

Ruemmler came under scrutiny earlier this year after her name appeared thousands of times in the records related to Epstein that were released by the justice department under the Epstein Files Transparency Act. She announced in February that she would be resigning from her role at Goldman Sachs as chief legal officer effective on 30 June.

Keir Starmer was told he would be remembered as a ‘giant of the Labour movement’ at final cabinet meeting

• Tell us: what do you want from the next Labour leader and UK prime minister?

Labour should ditch the triple-lock pensions promise to help tackle the UK’s straitened public finances, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has urged. Heather Stewart has the story.

I’m afraid we are not going to be able to open comments today for staffing reasons. If you want to contact me directly, it is probably best to get me on on Bluesky at @andrewsparrowgdn.bsky.social.

Lawmakers are one step closer to making daylight saving time permanent​ after the House passed a bill with overwhelming support.

While new study challenges assumptions about how far they travel, witnessing them in action still takes your breath away, scientists say

• Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

They may look like a fluffy flying carpet, but greater gliders are not as great at gliding as previously thought, Australian researchers have discovered.

The first study to measure the aerial ability of Australia’s largest gliding marsupial has found they soar across an average distance of 19 metres – far shorter than the 100 metres suggested in an 85-year-old study.

The same phenomenon that causes the beautiful aurora borealis may also cause way more havoc than previously thought.

Exclusive: Politician spoke to senior figures in Reform in March that year about covering lost earnings, sources tell the Guardian

Nigel Farage told senior figures in Reform UK he would need “a million a year” to cover lost earnings if he stood for parliament in the 2024 general election, sources have told the Guardian, raising further questions about why he was given £5m by a crypto billionaire.

Sources say the discussion took place in March 2024 – shortly before the undeclared gift was made by Christopher Harborne on 5 April, according to the Thailand-based crypto billionaire’s lawyers.

It's the latest effort by President Trump to make his mark on Washington, D.C.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Krebs on Security: Microsoft today released software updates to plug at least 570 security holes in its Windows operating systems and other software, almost triple the number of vulnerabilities the software giant fixed in its record-smashing Patch Tuesday release last month. Microsoft attributed the burgeoning patch counts to vulnerability discoveries aided by artificial intelligence. Nearly 60 of the bugs quashed in July's Patch Tuesday earned a "critical" severity rating, meaning miscreants or malware could use them to seize remote control over a Windows device with little or no help from the user. Microsoft also addressed three zero-day flaws, including two that are already being exploited in the wild. Two of the zero-day weaknesses allow an attacker to elevate their user rights on a Windows system, as do approximately 250 other elevation of privilege flaws fixed this month; they include CVE-2026-56155 - an Active Directory Federation Services bug -- and CVE-2026-56164, a Microsoft Sharepoint vulnerability. CVE-2026-50661 is a security feature bypass in Windows BitLocker that could allow attackers to gain access to encrypted data if they have physical access to the device. Microsoft said this bug has been detailed publicly, but that it is not aware of any active exploitation. In a blog post on July 9, Microsoft Executive Vice President Pavan Davuluri wrote that Windows users will notice "a higher volume of security updates included in each security release" as a result of AI aiding in the discovery of vulnerabilities. "The pace of vulnerability discovery is changing with advances in AI making it possible to find more issues, faster, across more code, with new mechanisms that can accelerate both discovery and analysis," Davuluri wrote.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Republican Trump ally has spent years promoting discredited claims about 2020 election

Donald Trump has endorsed Mike Lindell’s bid for Minnesota governor, calling the MyPillow founder “one of America’s greatest and most hard working Patriots” in a Truth Social post on Wednesday.

Trump described Lindell as someone who had “sacrificed” more than almost anyone else “in fighting for our country, especially when it comes to Election Integrity”, invoking Lindell’s years spent promoting discredited claims about the 2020 election. Trump said Lindell “will MAKE MINNESOTA GREAT AGAIN” and gave him full-throated support ahead of the state’s 11 August Republican primary, where early voting is already under way.

Ukraine's president is shaking up his government just as observers note positive changes in the trajectory of the war with Russia.

More density would also narrow racial pay gaps, while a decline in density correlated to surges in wealth inequality

Tripling union membership in the US would lead to a 14.5% raise for the median US worker, shifting $1.2tn to workers annually and significantly narrowing racial wage gaps, according to a new report released on Wednesday.

The report from the Economic Policy Institute notes that union membership rates across the workforce, also known as union density, was once three times as high as it is today. Union density in the 1950s was more than 30% before it started to decline in the 1960s. By the 1980s, union density dropped to 22.2% only to decline even further in recent decades, to 10% in 2025.

Exclusive: bill from Democratic lawmaker comes two days after Marco Rubio vowed to dismantle war crimes tribunal

The Democratic congresswoman Ilhan Omar introduced a resolution on Wednesday urging the United States to join the international criminal court (ICC), marking the first congressional pushback against the Trump administration’s pledge to “systematically disable” the war crimes tribunal through sanctions and diplomatic pressure.

Omar’s bill came two days after Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, vowed to dismantle the court.

Beneath the ​drone strikes and ​talk of ceasefires lies a battle over history that is testing ​Kyiv’s chances for an end to the conflict

• Don’t get This Is Europe delivered to your inbox? Sign up here

I’ve just come back from a trip to Kyiv, where after more than four years of war, it can feel like the political and diplomatic news agenda has become cyclical: a suggestion that some kind of peace deal could be around the corner, followed by the swift intervention of reality that the Kremlin has no interest in abandoning its maximalist goals, and we all go back to the drawing board.

We are now in a period where Russia has again stepped up its air attacks on the Ukrainian capital. Frequent mass drone and missile attacks keep Kyiv residents awake, and some even get through to the city centre, whereas in the past Ukrainian air defences were usually able to repel them. Nights can be noisy and scary: one attack while I was there killed 27 people. Thousands head into the metro to get some sleep.

A smart thermostat can lower cooling costs, but your actual savings depend on how you use it during extreme heat.

Councillors pass motion that paves way to setting up drugs-consumption facility where users can be helped and treated

• UK politics live – latest updates

Bristol has been formally declared a “city of harm reduction”, with local politicians pledging to focus on helping and treating users of illegal drugs rather than punishing them.

Green councillors, who lead the city council, said the declaration was a clear signal that public health rather than criminal justice solutions were needed to tackle the UK’s growing drugs crisis.

Up to 16in of rain fell in some areas as forecasters warn another foot could fall, prompting rescues and road closures

• Sign up for the Breaking News US newsletter email

Heavy rains in south Texas have washed out highways and stranded motorists, with forecasters warning that more severe weather could bring dangerous flooding to already drenched counties near the border with Mexico.

On Tuesday, storms dumped up to 16in of rain in some rural areas of the state, leading to the dispatch of emergency crews to make at least two dozen rescues across the region. Officials shut down parts of a highway near Uvalde, 80 miles west of San Antonio.

Star Wars director calls AI technology ‘the future’ of film-making and says ‘there’s nothing you can do about it’

The Star Wars director, George Lucas, has added his voice to the growing chorus of film-makers receptive to the rising use of AI tools in moviemaking.

Speaking in an interview with A Rabbit’s Foot, Lucas, 82, said: “Artificial intelligence means it’s much easier for us to make movies.”

Court of appeal rules Labour donor suffered ‘obvious injustice’ over use of his photo with headline referring to different man

The green energy entrepreneur and Labour donor Dale Vince is in line to receive damages from the publisher of the Daily Mail after claiming it used his picture to mislead millions of readers.

Vince, who has given more than £5m to Labour over several years, took legal action against Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL) over an article, published in June 2023, headlined “Labour repays £100,000 to sex pest donor”.

Tehran shuts strait of Hormuz and carries out retaliatory strikes as Trump threatens to hit civilian infrastructure

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Iran has threatened to halt all energy exports from the Middle East after the US reimposed a blockade of its ports and ships, as the two countries traded strikes for a fifth day and Donald Trump threatened to expand US strikes on Iran next week.

The US blockade came into force early on Wednesday, prompting Iran to shut the strait of Hormuz and carry out a wave of retaliatory airstrikes on countries hosting US bases in the region.

SAN JOSE, Calif., July 15, 2026 — Super Micro Computer, Inc., an AI, Enterprise, Storage, and 5G/Edge IT Total Solution Provider, featuring Data Center Building Block Solutions (DCBBS), today announced the expansion of its Rear Door Heat Exchanger (RDHx) portfolio, further strengthening its end-to-end liquid cooling solutions for high-density AI and HPC infrastructure. As a key component of DCBBS, the expanded RDHx portfolio offers flexible cooling capacities, providing data center operators with an easy-to-deploy path to liquid cooling for both new and legacy data centers.

“We continue to expand our DCBBS offerings to provide our customers with unmatched customization and optimization options,” said Charles Liang, president and CEO of Supermicro. “Our expanded RDHx portfolio helps customers realize the benefits of liquid cooling, with a range from 10kW up to 120kW of cooling at the door level, with a max of 240kW of cooling capacity at the rack-level, enabling more efficient data center operations.”

Customers can design and deploy validated rack-scale cooling solutions tailored to their facility requirements, infrastructure constraints, and workload demands, enabling higher compute density, improved cooling efficiency, and lower total-cost-of-ownership (TCO). The expanded portfolio of ten RDHx models can be deployed as a primary liquid cooling solution or integrated with Supermicro’s Direct-to-Chip (D2C) liquid cooling technologies as part of a complete DCBBS infrastructure solution.

Supporting cooling capacities from 10kW up to 120kW per rack, RDHx enables organizations to increase compute density and cooling efficiency for AI and HPC workloads without requiring major facility modifications. Compatible with standard EIA, ORv3, and MGX racks, the solutions integrate seamlessly into both new data center deployments and existing facilities. As part of Supermicro’s validated DCBBS portfolio, RDHx can be delivered with accelerated systems, rack-scale integration, facility power and cooling, intelligent management software, and deployment services, enabling customers to simplify procurement, reduce integration risk, and reduce Time-to-Online (TTO).

Key benefits of Supermicro RDHx solutions include the ability to:

• Deploy Anywhere: Mount directly to standard EIA, ORv3, and MGX racks for rapid deployment, in both new data centers or retrofits, without the need for dedicated facility chilled water or extra hardware
• Maximize Reliability: Optimize energy efficiency with intelligent fan control, N+1 redundancy, and anti-condensation protection for continuous operation and simplified maintenance
• Simplify Power Integration: Integrate DC-powered models with rack busbars for streamlined deployment or AC-powered models for broad infrastructure compatibility
• Monitor Infrastructure: Track temperature, pressure, flow rate, and pump status in real time using Redfish, SNMP, web-based management, and Supermicro SuperCloud Composer (SCC)

Supermicro DCBBS delivers complete, modular AI infrastructure built from validated components and subsystems, enabling flexible deployment from individual servers and networking to full rack-scale and data center-level solutions, including software and services. Supermicro continues to lead the industry with its comprehensive portfolio of AI infrastructure solutions, enabling organizations worldwide to deploy scalable, efficient, and environmentally responsible AI data centers.

Learn more about Supermicro’s RDHx portfolio here and in this video summary.

About Super Micro Computer, Inc.

Supermicro (NASDAQ: SMCI) is a global leader in Application-Optimized Total IT Solutions. Founded and operating in San Jose, California, Supermicro is committed to delivering first-to-market innovation for Enterprise, Cloud, AI, and 5G Telco/Edge IT Infrastructure. We are a Total IT Solutions provider with server, AI, storage, IoT, switch systems, software, and support services. Supermicro’s motherboard, power, and chassis design expertise further enables our development and production, enabling next-generation innovation from cloud to edge for our global customers. Our products are designed and manufactured in-house (in the US, Taiwan, and the Netherlands), leveraging global operations for scale and efficiency and optimized to improve TCO and reduce environmental impact (Green Computing). The award-winning portfolio of Server Building Block Solutions allows customers to optimize for their exact workload and application by selecting from a broad family of systems built from our flexible and reusable building blocks that support a comprehensive set of form factors, processors, memory, GPUs, storage, networking, power, and cooling solutions (air-conditioned, free air cooling or liquid cooling).

Source: Supermicro

The post Supermicro Expands Liquid Cooling Portfolio with New Rear Door Heat Exchangers appeared first on HPCwire.

As global anxieties multiply, ​v​ideo games from Resident Evil to Mouthwashing are providing rich source material to help decode society’s problems

• Don’t get Pushing Buttons delivered to your inbox? Sign up here

Horror is so hot right now. There’s Obsession, Evil Dead Burn and Hokum in the cinema, Widow’s Bay, From and Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen on TV, and, of course, a rotting smorgasbord of horror games including Resident Evil Requiem (pictured top) and Reanimal, soon to be joined by Silent Hill: Townfall, Silver Pines and Dreadmoor. We’re also seeing weird cross-pollinations, with horror movie studio Blumhouse making games, while games themselves become horror films and the whole backrooms genre infects every medium it touches.

So it was fascinating to attend last week’s horror and gaming conference at Falmouth University, in Cornwall: a gathering of students, researchers and lecturers, all engaged in the academic study of horror games. There were brilliant talks on zombies and posthumanism, the gothic in games, and the role of monstrous little girls in survival horror (there are a lot of them!). Subjects as diverse as masculine fragility, disability and ageing came up; Will Doyle, creative director at Supermassive Games, gave a great keynote on the art of creating horror in games using tools such as revulsion, spatial alienation and the human instinct of apophenia. I learned a lot about theorists such as Julia Kristeva and Mark Fisher, and about the technical similarities between indie horror games and film noir (for example, the use of darkness and creative camera techniques to “hide” budget restrictions). It was incredible fun.

Erroneous labels on some Subaru Crosstrek, Forester and Ascent cars could increase the risk of a crash, NHTSA said.

Pompano Beach resident Nancy Dello Stritto, who is almost 77 years old, opened her mail to find a license plate reading "SQZ A55."

Annual results show struggling firm’s net debt has risen to £19.7bn, up from £17.7bn a year earlier

• Business live – latest updates

Thames Water increased its bonus payouts to £4.1m for senior managers, despite warning over “material uncertainty” over its future as it scrambles to recapitalise to avoid nationalisation.

The water company also gave a pay rise to its chief executive, Chris Weston, and drew the ire of Emma Reynolds, the environment secretary, for paying him a previously deferred bonus of £99,000 – despite a ban on bonuses because of pollution failures.

Demonstrators across Maine gathered to call for an end to ICE operations after the fatal shooting of a Colombian national, Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, by an ICE agent. In Biddeford and Portland, speakers called for accountability and protesters marched holding anti-ICE signs. Outside an ICE facility in Scarborough, arguments broke out between protesters and an armed supporter of ICE

• ICE agents kill man in Maine as senator says victim not target of arrest

• Surveillance footage shows scene of deadly ICE shooting in Maine – video

July 15, 2026 — The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) announced today that Connecticut is one of twelve regions selected to receive an NSF Regional Innovation Engines (NSF Engines) award, joining a portfolio of regional technology clusters that are accelerating the development of critical technologies and building a durable U.S. technology advantage.

Credit: UConn

The NSF Quantum Technologies Engine in Connecticut, led by the University of Connecticut in partnership with Yale University, Southern Connecticut State University, Connecticut State Community College, ConnCORP, Connecticut Innovations, and the State of Connecticut, aims to advance American quantum innovation and secure the domestic quantum supply chain by accelerating the commercialization of quantum technologies for national defense, biotechnology, and financial services. Through innovation, applied research leading to new technologies, support for inventors and entrepreneurs, and workforce development, the NSF Quantum Technologies Engine will advance quantum sensing, secured communications, computing, and materials through shared testbed, deep-tech incubator and translation pathways.

“NSF Engines investments in critical technologies and future industries will transform America’s innovation infrastructure for decades to come,” says Brian Stone, performing the duties of the NSF director. “The NSF Quantum Technologies Engine will advance the Nation’s quantum innovation by accelerating the commercialization of quantum technologies for national defense, biotechnology and financial services.”

The NSF Quantum Technologies Engine in Connecticut (the QuantumCT Engine) team will initially receive a two-year, $15 million award. The funds will support the Engine’s technology translation, workforce development, and incubator operations. The funds will also facilitate industry and community engagement to deliver broad societal benefits. By demonstrating sufficient progress, the QuantumCT Engine has the potential to receive $160 million from NSF over the next decade.

The QuantumCT Engine will leverage world-leading research and innovation expertise from UConn and Yale to pursue translational research to benefit industry, generate technology ventures, and train the region’s workforce to enter a high-growth field. It will also deliver technology acceleration and startup support services to drive public-private partnerships and create a quantum ecosystem that generates economic growth.

Quantum technology industries are expected to grow to $200 billion by 2040, with the potential to reshape sectors important to Connecticut and the country, including aerospace, defense, drug development, manufacturing, and finance and insurance.

Connecticut companies that are adopting quantum technologies support over 270,000 jobs, accounting for 38% of wages in the state. They also are responsible for millions of jobs and over $28.7 billion in GDP nationwide.

“Connecticut is the nation’s leading state for quantum technology adoption,” says Pamir Alpay, UConn’s provost and the principal investigator on the NSF-funded proposal. “The award recognizes our team’s success in establishing partnerships with industry to accelerate quantum technologies and build a quantum-ready workforce.”

“This award application process was highly competitive, and it’s a huge win for Connecticut,” says Gov. Ned Lamont. “Our pioneering research and advanced application pipeline helped set us apart from the competition. Whereas other states may be theorizing about quantum, we’re already applying it together with corporate partners across the state. These federal funds, combined with state investment, will accelerate Connecticut’s progress in quantum technology and help establish our state as a national and global leader in this field—and we’re grateful for NSF’s support in getting us here. This investment will help create good jobs and new opportunities for workers across the economy as quantum’s impact grows.”

The NSF Engines program invests in regional ecosystems with the potential to drive economic growth through technological innovation. The QuantumCT Engine proposal was chosen for funding from a field of 15 finalists following a highly competitive national selection process.

“As Connecticut’s flagship public university and the state’s land-grant institution, UConn takes pride in its leadership role within the QuantumCT Engine. Our university is home to more than 60 esteemed faculty members who are experts in the field of quantum science and will collaborate with Yale researchers to drive innovative advancements and groundbreaking discoveries in quantum research,” UConn President Radenka Maric says. “Over the past three years, we have been working hand-in-hand with our academic, state, industry, and community partners to position quantum technologies as a catalyst for economic development that will fuel prosperity in our state and nation. It is crucial that America take the lead in the global quantum race to safeguard national security, secure our digital economy, and drive future economic growth. Furthermore, we must excel internationally in quantum healthcare to deliver life-saving therapeutics and diagnostics. I am grateful to Governor Lamont and Dan O’Keefe, the commissioner of the Department of Economic and Community Development, for their grand vision for our state.”

The State of Connecticut has pledged $121 million to the QuantumCT Engine, comprising $60 million already invested and an additional $60 million upon receiving the NSF award. This state support will build a quantum incubator in New Haven, the Engine’s hub, among other initiatives.

In 2023, NSF awarded the QuantumCT Engine team a $1 million NSF Engines Development Award through UConn, which established the operational structure and built the partnerships to drive the ecosystem. QuantumCT, a 501c3 nonprofit organization, was founded by UConn and Yale as part of the NSF Engine Development Award to support applied research, help companies explore quantum applications, generate startups, and prepare a skilled workforce.

Industry partners are key to the QuantumCT Engine’s success. Quantinuum and D-Wave are partnering to develop quantum computing testbeds with QuantumCT that will be used for experimentation and technology translation activities.

Quantum technology adopters – including RTX, Travelers, Boehringer Ingelheim, Pfizer, Amphenol, and Microsoft – have been working with the QuantumCT Engine team over the past several years on applied research projects that bring quantum capabilities directly to their product lines.

“With this transformative award, NSF has recognized the scale of the QuantumCT Engine’s ambition and its potential to accelerate the quantum revolution for our state, region, and the United States as a whole,” Yale University President Maurie McInnis says.

“I am so proud of this effort to develop real-world solutions that enrich our communities and of the spirit of collaboration that it represents,” she adds. “Together with our partners at UConn and across the state, we have been able to drive innovation and unleash economic growth, while fulfilling Yale’s vital mission of research and education.”

Alongside industry partnerships and state support, sustained investments by UConn and Yale have helped build the quantum ecosystem that this award will accelerate.

At Yale, this includes startups such as Quantum Circuits, co-founded by Robert Schoelkopf and Michel Devoret — whose pioneering work in quantum computing earned him the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physics — and recently acquired by tech innovator D-Wave with plans to double its workforce in New Haven.

Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU) also plays a critical role as the QuantumCT Engine’s workforce lead, with its QNT (CSCU Center for Quantum and Nanotechnology) serving as the optimal coordinator based on its successes in leading educational initiatives and strong alliances with industry, community stakeholders, and IHEs throughout Connecticut.

Through longstanding technical and education collaborations with Yale, UConn, and the CT State Community College System, the QNT is a conduit to all academic institutions in the state and to small and medium businesses including those in advanced manufacturing, biotech, photonics, and other supply chain sectors.

“Southern Connecticut State University is more than ready to take the lead on workforce development in Connecticut’s quantum ecosystem,” says Sandra Bulmer, interim president of the university. “We are proud to be part of Connecticut’s ‘research triangle,’ along with Yale and UConn, serving as the support for the talent pipeline. Our mission is grounded in access and opportunity, and the workforce piece of this effort enables us to open up new frontiers in research and innovation to countless students across Connecticut.”

More from HPCwire

• Connecticut Public University System Expands Nanotechnology Center into Quantum Hub
• Connecticut Investment in QuantumCT Supports Innovation Infrastructure
• UConn Partners with Google Quantum AI on New Quantum Sensing Study

Source: UConn

The post NSF Selects Connecticut Quantum Engine to Accelerate Quantum Commercialization appeared first on HPCwire.

"Healthful with Norah O'Donnell" launches July 22.

This option is now open to any parent with a Spotify account.

Yes, you should absolutely marathon them.

Anna Liedtke files criminal complaint in Israel over alleged attack by female guards and says abuse was intended to silence campaigners

The third time Anna Liedtke was subjected to an illegal strip-search in Israeli detention, female prison guards forced her on to her knees, covered her mouth to stop her screaming and raped her, according to interviews and a criminal complaint filed in Israel.

She described hearing male guards laughing during the attack, which she believes they watched and may have filmed. It took place in an area separated from the prison hallway by a partially drawn curtain that her attackers had left open.

LOS ANGELES, July 15, 2026 — Quantum Elements, a provider of AI-powered digital twins for quantum computing developers, has announced a development agreement with Planckian, an Italian quantum computing company ​​pioneering​​​ a novel​​​ ​​superconducting quantum processor architecture, to support Planckian’s error correction strategy.

Through this collaboration, Quantum Elements will develop architecture-specific noise models and digital twin capabilities to characterize the physical noise environment of Planckian’s superconducting architectures, accounting for coherence, leakage and operation-level error sources. The work will support Planckian in evaluating QEC schemes’ performance across its ​​unique​ ​processor designs.

“Our Digital Twins platform can accurately mirror quantum systems on classical computers, leading to a clear development path from system co-design to quantum error correction and all the way to fault-tolerant quantum computing​ for​ Planckian and other quantum hardware companies,” said Izhar Medalsy, co-founder and CEO of Quantum Elements. “We’ve shown that both theoretically and practically.”

“Our architecture removes the control complexity and infrastructure overhead that ​typical​ly prevents​​​ ​conventional superconducting processors​ from scaling​. However, a​​ new ​​approach also​​​ reshapes ​the errors the system has to contend with​,​” said Michele Dallari, co-founder and CEO of Planckian. “That makes architecture-specific characterization essential: we need a faithful picture of our own noise environment before we decide how to correct it. Quantum Elements’ digital twins ​​enable​​​ us​​ to​ evaluate error-correction schemes against a realistic model of our processors, on classical hardware and well ahead of scaling, the kind of groundwork a credible path to fault tolerance actually depends on​.​”

While quantum processors are becoming increasingly sophisticated, they are still affected by environmental noise, crosstalk between qubits, and control imperfections. These effects are obstacles to developing fault-tolerant quantum computers. To study this behavior, researchers often simulate quantum systems on classical computers. One way to do this is direct density-matrix simulation, which tracks a noisy quantum system, including both its quantum state and its interaction with the environment. However, the amount of information required to represent the system becomes prohibitive as qubit counts grow.

Quantum Elements’ Digital Twins technology allows researchers to model noisy quantum-circuit behavior with lower computational resources while preserving the dynamics needed to study quantum error correction, correlated noise, and decoder performance.

The practical application of this method was demonstrated in an AWS collaboration with Quantum Elements, USC, and Harvard, where researchers used a Quantum Monte Carlo-accelerated digital twin to simulate a 97-physical-qubit, distance-7 surface-code syndrome-extraction round on classical high-performance computing infrastructure. AWS reported that a brute force, full open-system simulation of the same system would require tracking 497 density-matrix entries, while the QMC-based method ran in about an hour on a single compute node.

About Planckian

Planckian is developing the core technology to power utility-scale quantum computers. By design, our chip architecture decouples control lines from qubit count, removing a key bottleneck in scaling. It combines the proven reliability of superconducting circuits with a new approach to qubit control, paving the way for quantum computers capable of solving the world’s most challenging problems. Launched in 2023, Planckian is proudly building from the heart of a world-class research ecosystem in Italy.

About Quantum Elements

Founded in 2023 in Los Angeles, Quantum Elements seeks to transform the quantum computing industry by making the path to real-world commercial applications more efficient and cost-effective through its proprietary, AI-native software stack and world-leading quantum Digital Twins.

Source: Quantum Elements

The post Quantum Elements and Planckian Partner on Digital Twins for Quantum Error Correction appeared first on HPCwire.

• Staff told to eject hecklers among expected 300,000 fans

• Officials reject Faldo’s calls to fine miscreants $10,000

The R&A has warned golf fans who misbehave at the Open that they will be identified and slung out under its new code of conduct.

Its chairman, Mark Darbon, stopped short of endorsing calls by Sir Nick Faldo, the last Englishman to win an Open, for anyone that abuses a player to also be fined $10,000. However, he confirmed that a team of R&A staff, marshals and officials would be closely monitoring the expected 300,000 spectators at Royal Birkdale to ensure good behaviour.

Promise Me, America to cover everything from economy to decision to drop bid for re-election

Former president Joe Biden will publish a memoir this fall, publisher Little, Brown and Company told the Associated Press.

Promise Me, America, which Biden says will touch upon everything from the economy to his decision to drop his bid for re-election, is scheduled to come out on 17 November.

The 154th Open starts at Royal Birkdale on Thursday with a host of compelling storylines to follow

Scottie Scheffler won the 2025 Open by four strokes but the world No 1 arrives at Royal Birkdale having missed the cut at last week’s Scottish Open. The out-of-form American has claimed his fewest wins in a season since 2021, having claimed only one victory all year: January’s American Express, in his first start of the year. Since then, Scheffler has recorded four runner-up finishes, including at the Masters. “I didn’t really feel like I played that bad,” he said of his missed cut, his first in four years. “This golf course can be just tough at times.”

I connected with experts to find out where our air quality is headed, and if air purifiers are the breath of fresh air we need.

A Louisiana man has been charged with murder in the fatal shooting of a deputy U.S. marshal who joined other officers in trying to arrest him.

Heavy smoke from several large wildfires blazing in Canada and Minnesota is expected to engulf large swaths of the Midwest and Northeast U.S. this week.

The U.S. announces new strikes on Iran just hours after a 4th consecutive nighttime barrage, as the war ramps back up over control of the Strait of Hormuz.

Treaty came into effect at midnight, eliminating border controls on land frontier with British overseas territory

• Europe live – latest updates

• UK politics live – latest updates

Spain and Gibraltar are celebrating the fall of the last frontier fence in western Europe after the signing of a post-Brexit deal that brings an end to border checks for residents, tourists and the thousands of Spanish workers who cross into the British overseas territory every day.

The agreement, which was signed in Brussels on Tuesday and came into effect at midnight, marks the conclusion of more than four years of negotiations between the UK, Spain, Gibraltar and the EU after Britain’s departure from the bloc.

The next great climate divide will be between countries that have the resources to adapt and those that don’t

This summer, much of the media’s attention has focused on record temperatures across Europe and the United States. Television coverage has been filled with familiar images: heat maps shaded deep red, schools closing, rail lines slowing, wildfires spreading and emergency rooms treating growing numbers of people with heat-related illnesses.

Public officials have responded with equally familiar advice: stay indoors, drink plenty of water and, if possible, turn on the air conditioning.

A smart scale can weigh you, but it also provides additional biometric data.

Upgrading your TV soon? One well-known TV brand is our readers' all-around favorite.

Nobel laureate María Corina Machado will not lead negotiations over new elections, contrary to expectations

The interim government of Venezuela has announced it will begin formal talks with the opposition aimed at “strengthening democracy” in the country.

The move is backed by the US, which says it is seeking a “democratic transition” in a country still recovering from the twin earthquakes that killed more than 4,700 people.

A blood test may predict if apparently healthy older adults are likely to develop Alzheimer's symptoms in the next five or 10 years, researchers say.

US president says power plants and bridges could be targeted, which would probably constitute war crimes. Plus, the bear that raided an elderly couple’s fridge, and a stolen cat involved in a bank robbery

Good morning. Donald Trump has threatened to expand US strikes on Iran next week to target civilian infrastructure including power plants and bridges if Tehran does not agree to a deal. Trump made similar comments in March. Destroying civilian infrastructure such as power and water facilities would be illegal under international humanitarian law and would probably constitute a war crime.

The US president, meanwhile, has U-turned on a threat that ships would have to pay a 20% fee to the US for “security” in the strait of Hormuz. He said he had decided to scrap the toll “based on highly productive conversations with Middle East leadership”, and touted “massive” investments. He said the US would continue to blockade Iranian ports.

How have Democrats responded to renewed hostilities? Senate Democrats blocked the advancement of a must-pass defense bill. Chuck Schumer, the Senate’s top Democrat, said his party could not support advancing the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) as long as the fighting continued.

Top House Democrats, meanwhile, have vowed to oppose a bid to cut US military aid to Israel as the party grapples with a rebellion among their voters over the party’s support for the Middle Eastern ally.

London Conference 2026: Europe’s defence: Building resilience against permanent threat Video thilton.drupal 15 July 2026

The panel explored the key issues shaping European defence today in the face of hybrid threats from Russia.

This panel at Chatham House’s 2026 London Conference discussed the theme of ‘Total defence: Building Europe’s resilience against permanent threat‘.

The panel, hosted by Olivia O’Sullivan, director of Chatham House’s UK in the World Programme, explored the following questions: 

• Has the era of hybrid threats exposed a fundamental gap between European ambitions and actual national resilience?
• What does ‘total defence’ mean in practice – and how far does responsibility extend beyond the state to business and citizens?
• Russia’s playbook targets soft vulnerabilities – infrastructure, information, institutions. Are European societies adequately hardened?
• Can liberal democracies protect their information ecosystems without compromising the openness that defines them?
• What must Britain and its European partners prioritize – in investment, legislation and public culture – to be genuinely resilient for the decade ahead?

Speakers:
The Rt Hon Al Carns, Former Minister for the Armed Forces, Ministry of Defence
Mikhail Kasyanov, Former Prime Minister, Russian Federation
Samantha de Bendern, Associate Fellow, Russia and Eurasia Programme, Chatham House
Chair: Olivia O’Sullivan, Director, UK in the World Programme, Chatham House

As the U.S. restarts its Iran blockade and carries out more strikes, President Trump has called off a planned 20% fee on shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.

• L’Équipe laments ‘mentally sunk’ players in Dallas

• Ouest France front page reads: ‘End of American dream’

French fans’ expectations of their national team had been at an all-time high: a semi-final on Bastille Day, Kylian Mbappé a hero, a squad unbeaten. Across the country, bars had been packed with viewers spilling on to pavements, ready to crack open the fireworks ahead of hopes for the final.

But the night was unexpectedly subdued, streets cleared early. On Wednesday morning, the French media were still digesting the disappointment of defeat in a World Cup semi-final, praising Spain’s performance in Texas while struggling to comprehend Les Bleus’ fall from a high.

The U.S. military said daytime attacks were underway early Wednesday after seven hours of overnight strikes. President Trump had also said he might “knock out” Iran's power plants and bridges next week.

Astronauts on SpaceX's Fram2 mission successfully captured diagnostic X-ray images in orbit for the first time. The milestone gives space medicine a second imaging option beyond ultrasound and could help future crews diagnose injuries, inspect equipment, and support longer missions to the moon or beyond. Popular Science reports: Commercial off-the-shelf X-ray machines like the ice cooler-sized MinXray TR90BH now allow users to perform scans on subjects far away from traditional facilities. In 2022, [Mayo Clinic researcher Sheyna Gifford] assisted in preparing a crew to successfully generate digital X-rays while experiencing microgravity during a parabolic flight. Gifford's team then spent years collaborating with SpaceX to plan another feasibility study. This time, they didn't want to operate an X-ray machine aboard an aircraft simulating the conditions in space -- they intended to use the equipment during an orbital mission. The process was detailed in a recently published study in the journal Radiology, and focuses on last year's Fram2 mission. Instead of days of medical training, astronauts spent only four hours learning how to use their portable radiography device. They then took preflight X-rays of a hand, forearm, chest, abdomen, and pelvis ahead of their SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launch on March 31, 2025. Once in orbit, the team calibrated the system before testing their MinXray on the same body parts as well as a smartwatch. Once the crew returned, a trio of independent radiologists reviewed the orbital X-ray images based on their positioning, spatial and contrast resolutions, and general scan quality. Although positioning scores were slightly decreased for the central body images, every other scan held up to similar examples created on Earth. Meanwhile, the astronauts reported that using the machine was easy despite minimal prior coaching. Looking ahead, researchers hope to conduct further X-ray tests during orbital missions, while continuing to reduce the overall size of equipment.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Exclusive: Andrew Bailey says he does not regret meeting Reform UK leader to discuss cryptocurrency regulation

The Bank of England governor has said he would have put off a meeting with Nigel Farage last autumn had the Reform UK leader’s £5m gift from a crypto billionaire been under investigation at the time.

Andrew Bailey said he did not regret meeting Farage to discuss the Bank’s plans for cryptocurrency regulation last September, months before the controversial donation from the Thailand-based investor Christopher Harborne was revealed by the Guardian in April.

Worse-than-expected figures for three months to June come amid concerns over lopsided economy

• Business live – latest updates

China has posted worse-than-expected growth figures for the three months to June as its economy expanded by just 4.3% – one of its lowest quarterly readings on record.

The rate, which came in under the government’s target of 4.5% to 5%, was one of the weakest since reporting on official quarterly GDP figures began in the early 1990s.

The Iraqi leader was in Washington to meet with President Trump.

Among Verizon's unlimited phone plans, here are CNET's favorites.

As Ann Widdecombe’s death raises concerns over security, politicians describe the threats and aggression they have faced and the anxiety it causes

Jess Phillips has received so many death threats she has to remind herself not to be blase. One night she received more than 600 rape threats. In 2019, a man forced his way into her office. The same year a white supremacist sent her a picture of Jo Cox, her friend and fellow Labour MP who was murdered in 2016, accompanied with the message: “I will have you dealt with.”

“This is not academic to me; it is something I face every day,” says the MP for Birmingham Yardley. “You learn to cope with it, but it does cause terrible anxiety. For me, I feel guilty about the people who work for me, my kids, my family.”

A group of 26 Meta employees has sued the company, claiming it used AI to choose people for layoffs, disproportionately targeting those on medical, parental or family leave.

Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare, who is investigating the fatal ICE shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, told CBS News ICE's tactics "in no way resemble" the behavior of police agencies he's worked with.

Mayor of London backs calls from unions to update health and safety rules in light of more frequent heatwaves

The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, is backing calls for a maximum workplace temperature as pressure grows on the government to protect workers from the impact of repeated heatwaves across the UK.

The extreme heat has left people struggling to cope as temperatures in some workplaces climb above 40C, causing thousands of schools to close and hospital and transport systems to break down.

Extradition request for James ‘Fergie’ Chambers sparks concerns that US government is conflating humanitarian aid with terrorism

The arrest in Ibiza and US justice department extradition request for a wealthy American donor to lefwing causes in connection with alleged material support for Hamas is sending ripples through leftwing circles in Spain and being closely monitored in the US for potential “chilling effects” on support for Palestine.

Spanish authorities detained James “Fergie” Chambers Friday and are now holding him without bail in Madrid. A hearing is scheduled on whether he can be released on bail for Thursday.

The senator is alive, a key requirement to maintain one’s job in the US Senate

Like any good proof-of-life photo, it featured that day’s newspaper. After a nearly month-long disappearance, when it was clear that he had been rushed to the hospital but not clear why or in what condition, Mitch McConnell broke his silence, as they say in the tabloids, by releasing a photograph of himself sitting upright in a hospital bed. He wore a pink button-up shirt, and his vacant, lipless mouth seemed to form something meant to resemble a smile. Beside him was his wife, the comparatively pert former Trump transportation secretary Elaine Chao, her coiffed hair as stiff as the couple’s determination. In a statement, McConnell said that he had been hospitalized after a fall, and was being treated for pneumonia.

The picture was meant to put an end to the rampant speculation over whether the senator, aged 84, was dead or not. You would think this would be a simple enough question to answer. If the man himself wasn’t available to clear up the matter, couldn’t someone have held two fingers to the inside of his wrist to check for a pulse, or propped a hand mirror under his nose to see if it fogged? No such luck, apparently. The Kentucky senator was missing for weeks, with no word, his office only releasing vague and repetitive acknowledgments that he had been hospitalized. Public emergency services records indicate that paramedics were called to his Washington address on 14 June, where they administered CPR on an unconscious person who was allegedly suffering a cardiac arrest – one whose identity has been withheld. McConnell had been in a Washington DC area hospital ever since.

Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist

Plaintiffs allege ‘profound’ chilling effect on protected work of international criminal court officials and others

Two US advocacy groups sued the Trump administration on Wednesday, alleging that sanctions targeting Palestinian rights organizations, international criminal court (ICC) officials and a UN expert have unlawfully violated Americans’ first amendment rights.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Manhattan, argues that the administration’s sweeping 2025 sanctions package has had a “profound” chilling effect on Palestine-related advocacy, compelling Americans to sever professional relationships and abandon constitutionally protected work.

Oil giant has denied involvement, but climate activists are closely watching court case against Israeli private investigator for answers

A group of American climate activists are closely watching a US court case that could reveal who hired hackers to target their inboxes a decade ago.

In 2015, a set of explosive media reports revealed that ExxonMobil’s own scientists determined as early as 1982 that the extraction and burning of fossil fuels caused the climate crisis – but Exxon went on to fund climate denial campaigns anyway. The reports prompted attorneys general to investigate the company.

Guardian analysis found the removals coincided with the Trump administration’s push to weaken efficiency rules

As millions of Americans prepare for another brutal heatwave, it’s now harder to find information about ways to stay cool while saving energy and keeping utility costs down.

At least 1,662 Department of Energy webpages offering guidance on protecting the electrical grid during heatwaves have gone dark as of 3 July, according to a Guardian analysis of a list of deleted URLs provided by researchers at the Internet Archive, a non-profit that hosts a repository of more than a trillion archived webpages.

At her private school just beyond the city limits of Jonesboro, Arkansas, Mary “Tracy” Morrison demanded the attention of the 19 students seated on the floor in a circle. She then directed a skinny 13-year-old boy wearing a cartoon Mario shirt to sit in the center.

“Raise your hand if he’s ever been mean to you — ever,” Morrison, the owner, prompted the other middle schoolers, and some hands shot up.

“Most people don’t think you’re a nice kid. You lie. You lie all the time,” she told the boy. She encouraged his classmates to name things they don’t like about him.

Morrison’s voice got louder. She knelt inside the circle just inches from the boy and swatted him. On the head. On the neck. At first he flinched and started to raise his hands to block her. But she snapped at him to keep his arms down: “You don’t have the right!”

“Come over here and put your hands on him, however you want,” Morrison told the students. 

A boy volunteered. “I’ll do it,” he said, and the other students cheered and clapped.

That student entered the circle, looped his arm around the boy’s neck and choked him. Morrison gave him a high-five. The boy in the center cowered. Then other students took turns slapping, pinching and punching the boy. Morrison picked up a footlong plastic cylinder — it resembled a pipe — and thwacked him over and over, calling him a liar.

The attack went on for nearly 40 minutes. At the end, Morrison made the boy apologize to his classmates for mistreating them. Three other school employees were in the room that day in April 2025 but didn’t intervene. The whole thing was captured on video.

Morrison had founded her school, The Delta Institute for the Developing Brain, the year before, soon after Arkansas legislators decided to allow families to use public money for private school tuition through its Education Freedom Account program. 

Delta Institute joined a surge of new private schools in Arkansas, mirroring a national proliferation. New schools are opening at a fast clip as state legislatures set aside more public money for parents to spend at private schools, without meaningful oversight. 

There were about 100 private schools in Arkansas in 2023, state records show. Now there are about 220. That doesn’t count the 100 or so microschools in the mix — a version of the one-room schoolhouse that wasn’t tracked or publicly funded previously.

But even with that boom, Arkansas largely has chosen not to regulate private or microschools or monitor what’s happening inside them. Arkansas is so hands-off that the state only requires that private schools conduct regular fire drills, keep immunization records and have an American flag and a flagpole. It doesn’t review schools’ curriculum or the backgrounds and capabilities of their operators. Anyone is free to open one, including Morrison.

Known to parents and students as Dr. Tracy, she wasn’t a licensed educator and had never run a school before. Her resume says she has a doctorate in occupational therapy and cognitive neuroscience from Washington University in St. Louis. The university said that degree is only in occupational therapy.

The Delta Institute didn’t look much like a school — it operated in a white colonial house set down a gravel driveway off a country road, its bedrooms transformed into classrooms. But it had seemed like the answer that parents of students with disabilities, including autism, were desperately seeking. Families said they put their faith in Morrison, who presented herself as an expert in autism and ADHD. “I am the best,” she texted one parent. 

Morrison did not respond to interview requests and questions from ProPublica. 

Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who has said she wants to be known as the education governor, and state education officials didn’t respond to specific questions from ProPublica about the state’s oversight of private schools or how it responded to revelations about the Delta Institute. Her spokesperson said the governor championed the state’s Education Freedom Accounts because they give students more and different educational opportunities.

Both the governor’s office and the Arkansas Department of Education emphasized that the state intervenes to ensure students are safe and taxpayer dollars are spent responsibly. “Student safety is ADE’s number one priority,” Education Department spokesperson Kaelin Clay wrote in an email.

The day after Morrison and the children assaulted her son, the boy’s mother walked into the Craighead County Sheriff’s Office to write out a report in neat, looping cursive. It was not the first report about Morrison’s treatment of children at the Delta Institute that the sheriff’s office took.

Another mother had reported abuse about three weeks earlier.

More Money Fuels Growth 

Before Arkansas’ LEARNS Act passed in 2023, creating its voucher-style program, state schools secretary Jacob Oliva promised that “there is going to be accountability for the schools that participate.”  

But the oversight role his department gave itself was related primarily to finances. The department has the power to conduct random financial audits of private schools, mandate that the schools report their tuition and fees and require schools to measure student achievement with tests of their choosing, but little else.

Under pressure to tweak the rules this spring, the department again declined to monitor school quality and tinkered only with how parents can use the funds on items other than tuition, banning them from paying for travel sports teams, for instance. Even that was controversial; some lawmakers argued there should be less government interference. They argue the onus is on parents to decide whether their children are safe and learning, and if they’re not, the families can go somewhere else.

This upcoming school year, Arkansas expects that nearly 55,000 students will use their Education Freedom Accounts for tuition and other expenses. 

With most students getting about $7,000 each, the program cost about $310 million in taxpayer funds this past school year. Most of the students who used EFA money in Arkansas the prior year were already attending private school or being homeschooled, or were just starting kindergarten. Only 12% of participants reported that they’d previously attended a public school. 

When the program began, the department set up a hotline and an email address for people to report suspected fraud or misuse of the EFA funds. About a dozen emails raised concerns about student well-being.

But several complainants told ProPublica that they did not hear from state officials after sharing their concerns. One teacher said she got no response after she emailed in April that students who transferred to her school had been deprived of a “basic education” at the microschool they previously attended, according to state records. She said first and second graders reported that they had spent the majority of their time playing.

Contacted by a ProPublica reporter, she said: “I don’t mind that you are reaching out but it is very concerning and in a way aggravating that I have an investigative reporter reaching out instead of my own state.” She requested that her name not be made public because she works at a different microschool. 

Jazzmin Little said she hasn’t heard back from state officials either, after telling them in February that the school where she sent her two children might be misusing state funds. The department told her it would review the information, according to emails, but she said she heard nothing more. 

“All kinds of red flags I sent to them and they never got back to me,” Little said. “I don’t even know if anyone has looked at it.” The school’s founder confirmed that the Education Department did not reach out to her after receiving the parent’s complaint, which she described as a billing discrepancy. She said the issue would have been resolved sooner if the state had intervened.

In order to accept EFA money, private schools have to agree to meet some requirements, including that they have or are seeking accreditation, have operated for a year and promise to perform background checks and fingerprinting on all employees. (There’s no requirement that employees have no criminal history.) Schools affirm they’ll teach English, math, science and social studies and administer a standardized test of their choosing once a year. There’s no requirement to report students’ individual test scores to the state or to parents.

The bar is lower for microschools, some of which operate like smaller versions of private schools while others provide programs for homeschoolers. They don’t need to be accredited or wait until they’ve been open for a year to get funding. 

The contrast with what is required for public schools is striking. Arkansas’ Education Department monitors public schools, and state law regulates nearly every aspect of them, from teacher qualifications to what’s on district websites. Every district is required to post a tranche of “state-required information” online that must include breakdowns of monthly expenses and even a list of every dyslexia intervention program used. 

State Sen. Bryan King, a Republican, said he supports school choice but said he voted against the LEARNS Act because there wasn’t enough accountability given the amount of public spending. He proposed legislation this spring that would have required all schools receiving EFA funds to administer the same standardized test — and for funding to be tied to student performance on that exam.  

“We can’t afford this and my concerns were about financial responsibility, accountability, transparency, everything about it,” he said. 

The proposal did not advance. King was attacked in the primary this year for being against “education freedom,” and Sanders backed his opponent. King still prevailed.

None of the legislators who were the lead sponsors of the LEARNS Act responded to questions from ProPublica about how the state is overseeing student achievement and safety.

Several Arkansas groups recently tried to get an amendment on the November ballot that would require all schools that accept EFA funds to follow the same rules and minimum academic requirements as public schools. The groups, however, failed to gather enough signatures.

“If you are going to take public money, then you should meet public standards and be publicly accountable for how that money is spent,” said Bill Kopsky, executive director of the Arkansas Public Policy Panel, a nonprofit that was formed in the 1960s and focuses on social justice.

He said the state’s recent voucher expansion has led to “this whole new industry of pop-up, subprime private schools that have almost no regulation. They go into shopping malls or the basements of churches,” he said. 

In the three years of the EFA program, the state has only intervened at two schools, records show. And it’s never permanently blocked a school from taking public money, including at the Delta Institute — even after it became clear that terrible things had happened there.

“You Are in the Biggest Trouble”

Craighead County Sheriff’s Detective David Bailey, a Jonesboro native who patrolled the area often, didn’t even know there was a school set back off the country road.

He discovered the Delta Institute in the winter of 2025 after a student ran off and the school asked for help finding him. He didn’t know it at the time, but police and child-welfare records show the boy had allegedly fled after Morrison sprayed him in the face with water and held his legs down. He jumped out a window, barefoot, to get away.

The Craighead County Sheriff’s Office encountered the school again in March 2025 when Renee Johns, whose children Jacob and Addison went to the Delta Institute, reported abuse there. 

Johns had moved her family to Jonesboro from about an hour away to attend the school. But things had unraveled. Jacob wasn’t getting the therapy he needed, and he and his sister were falling behind academically. But Johns said she was most troubled by a video Morrison had texted her one day to explain why Jacob was being kept after school.

It showed Jacob, a 10-year-old with autism, and two other boys scrubbing the floor and walls inside the school with rags. Morrison berated them: “This doesn’t get to be about fun. Go!”

“Both hands, cleaning!” she barked like a drill sergeant to one boy on his hands and knees. “You’re working like a slug! Get at it! Get at it! You are in the biggest trouble.”

The sheriff’s office alerted child-welfare authorities. Then, three weeks later, a second mother walked in to report her son’s assault within the circle at school. Bailey got a warrant for that video.

Teacher and counselor Ashley Williams was standing by while another employee copied the footage of Morrison berating, hitting and directing other students to assault the 13-year-old boy. Horrified, she excused herself, hustled down the stairs of the house, out to the gravel parking area, and vomited.

Less than 12 hours earlier, Williams had filed a detailed report with welfare authorities based on what some students had told her about Morrison’s “circle time.” She had written, “This is not the first time abuse like this has happened.” Months earlier, she continued, Morrison had taped two children together by their arms.

More came out in Bailey’s interviews with parents and current and former employees and in interviews that child advocates conducted with the students, documents show: allegations of “waterboarding” a child and cutting another’s hair as punishment. Slapping a student. A wooden paddle named Fred.

Some parents, meanwhile, defended Morrison and praised her “unorthodox methods,” according to interviews and police records. 

Morrison worked to keep parents on her side. She texted a large group of staff members, some whose children attended the school, to say she had made a mistake during the “group discussion” but blamed the violence on the students.

She warned that the floor-scrubbing video she had sent Johns would likely be made public and that she and the other employees would be arrested. “You can expect our mug shots on social media,” Morrison said, and apologized for letting everyone down. But she also called it a “witch hunt.”

“My mug shot will have me with a middle finger,” she wrote. 

Flimsy Investigations

Within days of the April 2025 incident that the prosecutor called a “makeshift ‘Fight Club,’” Morrison was charged with 11 felony counts of permitting child abuse and other related crimes. Three other employees were charged with permitting child abuse and failure to report child maltreatment.

The day news broke about Morrison’s arrest, the state Education Department stopped EFA payments to the Delta Institute. Nearly half the students there were using the EFA program to pay tuition, and the school had collected more than $300,000 so far.  

There are no records of a visit to the school or an investigation by the state Department of Education. When asked if the department had gone to The Delta Institute for the Developing Brain, officials did not answer. Instead, a spokesperson said that complaints or suspicious activity triggers a review and “often results in a site visit,” though they declined to say how often that has happened.

Reporters again asked the department directly if it had visited the school. The spokesperson responded: “We have addressed the Developing Brain’s suspension from the EFA program multiple times, including in statements sent to your outlet.”

At Delta, public money flowed again two days after it was stopped. An assistant education commissioner who oversees the EFA program told a colleague he was convinced that the school had implemented “appropriate safeguards,” according to an email. He wrote that Morrison had resigned as the head of the school and a new school board had been formed.

In the three school years of the EFA program, records show, state education officials have temporarily suspended funding to one other school, a Christian-based microschool called Homestead Academy that focuses on outdoor and individualized education. It rents space from a church near Hot Springs. Outside, there’s a playground and hammocks, as well as a red-and-white striped shed painted with “In God we trust” where fireworks are sold in the summer.

Over a month last fall, the state got a series of concerning calls and emails from parents and at least one former teacher, records show.

Some shared safety concerns or described children playing unsupervised in a wooded area. Others shared concerns about insufficient academic instruction. One caller said Homestead felt more like a daycare than an organized school. In the first few months of the school year, 13 of the 46 students withdrew, state records show.

“Please stop” funding the school, one parent pleaded.

Oliva, the state education secretary, heard directly from a Homestead parent who said the school did not follow a curriculum and had not adhered to the education plan for her daughter.

“Why are there not stronger regulations and accountability measures for EFA-funded programs?” she wrote in bold letters. (The parent asked that her name not be used because she works in education and fears retaliation.)

“This sounds like a serious and dire situation,” Oliva wrote back to her. “We will review immediately.” 

A state education employee reached out to Homestead’s owner in late October and told her that the department would be stopping by the next day for a “brief visit.” 

While there, Education Department employees watched students say the Pledge of Allegiance and then observed 10 to 15 minutes of instruction before meeting with owner Lindsey McCollum.  

When asked for student work, progress reports and discipline policies, McCollum said she would send them later. “In hindsight, we should have said we were happy to wait while they made copies for us, but we did not,” according to an employee’s written report about the visit.   

Afterward, the state suspended EFA funding to the school. Oliva told McCollum in a letter: “Your actions have jeopardized the welfare of students and the responsible use of public funds.”

It took 10 weeks for EFA funds to flow again. The state required that McCollum provide certain documentation and was satisfied by her response: a financial review of the school, policies on student supervision, curriculum plans and student worksheets. Several parents also sent letters in support of the school, describing it as a nurturing environment where their students enjoyed learning.

“We were compliant and transparent,” McCollum said in an interview. She noted that both she and the other teacher at the school are certified educators and stressed that “student safety is of utmost importance and our school has procedures in place.” 

The school, she said, is almost entirely funded through the EFA program, with about 30 students from kindergarten to ninth grade. She said almost all students have returned year after year. “Families have the option to choose and still are choosing us,” she said. 

“We have families who know that their kids who hated learning are now loving to read and write and loving to learn,” McCollum said. “That is our heartbeat.” 

The state Education Department said it “wastes no time” in suspending private schools from receiving public money, and that both Homestead and Delta convinced the state that they were worthy of being reinstated. “In both instances, we worked vigorously to ensure operations were flipped in the right direction before families were allowed to spend taxpayer dollars on either school,” according to the department’s statement to ProPublica.

The parent who emailed Oliva said that she had enrolled her 10-year-old daughter at Homestead hoping for something different than the public school. But she said her daughter fell behind academically. Last fall, she pulled her from the school and reenrolled her in public school. 

She didn’t know that the state had restored funding to Homestead until told by a reporter. 

“No way,” she said. “This has to be happening with other microschools. That upsets me for the children of Arkansas.”

Still Open for Business

Enrollment at the Delta school dropped to about 60 students for last school year, about half the size it was the year before. 

“There was a lot of loss because of the negative media,” Adrian Sportsman, who has worked closely with Morrison at the school, said when a ProPublica reporter visited this spring. “I feel like it was blown way out of proportion.”

Some students came back, she said: “They’d say, ‘There’s no school like this school.’”

In March, the mother of the boy who was assaulted in the circle at school sued Morrison, her school, her therapy business and her insurance companies seeking compensatory and punitive damages for what happened to her son. In court filings, Morrison’s attorney denied the allegations and said “the video speaks for itself.”  

The criminal cases were set to go to trial in May and June. None did. Charges were dismissed for two employees who authorities felt were less culpable as they’d been in the classroom only briefly. The two employees did not respond to a reporter’s outreach.

A third staffer, Kathrine Lipscomb, who is an Arkansas-licensed teacher, interjected at times to direct the children to listen to Morrison and raise their hands to speak. In response to a reporter’s question about her role in the incident, she explained in an email: “For part of the time, I was off behind the teachers desk planning for another class and not paying attention to the circle.” 

The prosecutor and Lipscomb agreed to a pre-trial diversion program in which Lipscomb would serve six months of probation. She must do 40 hours of community service with disabled children and complete anger management classes to avoid a conviction. 

She is now director of education at the school.

Morrison pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 30 days in jail, 120 days on house arrest and five years of probation. She had to surrender her Arkansas occupational therapy license. And she agreed to not work with kids in any professional capacity during her probation.

Nobody seemed happy with Morrison’s punishment. But the prosecutor said the state decided the plea deal was the best option to make sure Morrison was held accountable. Under Arkansas law, the state would have to prove substantial physical harm to the victim in order to convict on a charge of permitting abuse to a minor, and juries can judge that differently, said Sonia Hagood, who prosecuted the case for the state. For instance, she said, a recent jury decided not to convict a defendant because the victim did not suffer serious physical injury.

As part of her deal, Morrison got to pick where she served her time — the Greene County Detention Center, which is newer than Craighead County’s jail and gave her a private cell. And she’s serving house arrest on her boyfriend’s Missouri ranch, where she can ride horses.

She passed the time while incarcerated on the phone and on video calls from a personal tablet. It’s standard for all communication from jail to be recorded, and ProPublica obtained more than 500 recordings. They show she was still involved with the administration of the school while jailed. 

She spoke frequently to Sportsman about school finances, including telling her to make sure the EFA money still was coming in. Sportsman, who owns Delta Therapy Group, the occupational therapy practice that works with Delta Institute students, said that the jail conversations were “informal conversations between friends” and disputed the idea that Morrison was running the school while incarcerated.

Morrison chatted for hours with her new board members and school employees and gave them to-do lists. She asked how some kids were doing. In a call with the teacher who also entered a plea deal, she called the victim’s mother “evil” for going to the police.

She also spoke with a documentary filmmaker who is interested in the school’s story and plans to pitch a project to a big streamer, like Netflix or HBO. In one call with the documentarian, Morrison described the abuse she’d been jailed for as a “restorative” technique to try to help the children treat one another more respectfully.

“It was never about, like, ‘Go hit him,’ right?’’ she said. “And the concept is so sophisticated that it’s like, if the prosecuting attorney wanted to know my story, if the detective — they would’ve interviewed me. They would have couched it like, ‘Oh, this is an intervention of individuals who are high risk, who will end up in prison themselves if they behave this way.’ They didn’t do that.”

Both the prosecutor and detective tried to interview Morrison during the investigation but she refused to speak with them.

Morrison was released from jail June 1.

“I think she should be prevented from teaching anywhere in the United States of America and having children around if she’s going to try to influence them the way she did,” Bailey, the detective on the case, said. “If we can’t protect our kids, who can we protect?

The Latest Complaint

There’s nothing in state law that prevents Morrison from still owning Delta or another private school and benefiting from public funding. 

Records still list Morrison’s family business as the owner of the Delta Institute property. State business records also show that she still is the registered agent for a private school at the same address. The school recently took a new name: North Star Academy. 

Lipscomb said the school’s board changed the name “as part of the process of healing for our community of families and students that are here and still trying to make sense of the world as we know it now.” Lipscomb said Morrison has “zero involvement” with the school right now.

She said she expects as many as 35 students to attend this upcoming school year. 

Renee Johns said Jacob has never recovered from his traumatic time at the Delta school. He has grown increasingly aggressive. He’s used martial arts moves that the school taught children in lieu of P.E. to punch holes in the wall of her home and lash out at her. 

Her daughter, Addison, returned to public school. She loves her new school, but was so far behind that she needed to repeat third grade. “School is for helping, not for hurting,” the 10-year-old recently told a ProPublica reporter.

Johns said parents who chose Morrison’s school and went along with her methods were sold lies. “We honestly thought we were doing the best for our children.”

The public keeps filing complaints about private and microschools with the Education Department. In late March it received a new request to investigate The Delta Institute for the Developing Brain. It came from a woman who had heard concerning reports from a family with a child at the school.

“Given the population served by this program, ensuring a safe, structured, and educationally appropriate environment is especially important. I would greatly appreciate your office’s attention to reviewing these concerns,” the woman wrote to the state’s hotline.

Lipscomb said she’s not aware of any active complaints. The state won’t comment on whether it’s investigating. 

The post This Private School Had Students Scrub Floors and Attack a Fellow Classmate. The State Still Funds It. appeared first on ProPublica.

Two pro-Palestine groups filed a lawsuit Wednesday that takes aim at U.S. sanctions against international human rights groups linked to efforts to hold Israel accountable for war crimes.

The lawsuit, filed in a New York federal court by Democracy for the Arab World Now, or DAWN, and Taxpayer Alliance Against Genocide, seeks to reverse sanctions brought under Executive Order 14203.

The order, which President Donald Trump made in February 2025, grants the administration power to issue penalties against any person or group seeking to bring a case against the U.S. or its allies — namely Israel — before the International Criminal Court.

The plaintiffs, both of whom coordinate with international NGOs in an effort to hold the U.S. and Israel accountable for war crimes, are seeking a declaration that the ICC sanctions are in violation of their First Amendment rights because they create obstacles to free association. The lawsuit also asks for an injunction barring the Trump administration from using sanctions to stymie free speech.

Trump’s assault on the ICC — most recently including a vow to “dismantle” the court — has focused mostly on efforts to hold Israel accountable for war crimes. In November 2024, the court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, another Israeli official, and an official with the armed Palestinian group Hamas for activities during the time period of Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

The White House executive order came down shortly after the arrest warrants were issued.

The rights groups’ lawsuit specifically highlights sanctions against Francesca Albanese, the U.N. official tasked with probing human rights violations in the occupied Palestinian territories, and three Palestinian nongovernmental organizations. According to the plaintiffs, the sanctions impinge on their First Amendment rights by preventing them from engaging in protected speech activities with Albanese and the NGOs.

“The Trump administration is using the blunt instrument of economic sanctions not only to punish human rights defenders but to police the political expression of millions of Americans,” said Omar Shakir, the executive director of DAWN, which was founded by journalist Jamal Khashoggi before his assassination by the Saudi government. “The government is violating the constitutional rights of American citizens in order to shield officials of a foreign government who have committed a genocide.”

Related

How the U.S. Derailed an Effort to Prosecute Its Crimes in Afghanistan

The defendants named in the suit are Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, and Brad Smith, the director of the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control. (None of the American government officials immediately responded to requests for comment.)

Trump and his allies’ war on the international human rights community goes back years: In 2020, Trump issued sanctions against an ICC prosecutor after she called for an investigation into U.S. human rights abuses in Afghanistan.

Shortly after retaking the White House, Trump lifted Biden-era sanctions on Israeli settlers involved in violence against Palestinians and destruction of their property. Trump then issued Executive Order 14203, “Imposing Sanctions on the International Criminal Court,” which placed visa restrictions and financial penalties on individuals and groups seeking to help the ICC in any potential case against the U.S., Israel, or other allies.

Months later, the administration issued sanctions against Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur. Albanese was briefly removed from the sanctions list in May after a federal judge ruled that the sanctions violated her rights, but the Office of Foreign Assets Control, which administers U.S. sanctions, added her to the list again days later, according to Al Jazeera.

The Albanese sanctions were followed in September 2025 with an edict sanctioning three NGOs: Al Haq, Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, and the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights.

Related

YouTube Quietly Erased More Than 700 Videos Documenting Israeli Human Rights Violations

In addition to penalizing Albanese and the NGOs, the sanctions bar any U.S. people or groups from engaging with them and make it a federal offense to receive or provide any “service” related to designated groups and people — an action the plaintiffs argue is in violation of their First Amendment rights.

The lawsuit comes at a moment of heightened attention to the sanctions against the ICC. Days before the lawsuit was filed, Rubio launched a broadside against the ICC in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece laying out a case for “dismantling” the court. Rubio specifically cited calls by DAWN for an investigation into potential war crimes in the U.S. bombing campaign against Iran.

“The ICC is backed and run by a powerful network of leftist nongovernment organizations, smug globalists, and hostile Third World governments united by their enmity toward the U.S.,” Rubio wrote. “Using all the tools at our government’s disposal, working beside every ally with whom we can make common cause, we will dismantle the ICC—brick by brick, if necessary.”

The timing of Rubio’s renewed attack on the ICC alongside the lawsuit appears to be a coincidence, but only serves to further underscore the stakes, according to Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man, a spokesperson for DAWN.

“The fact that he mentioned DAWN in his Wall Street Journal op-ed shows that the risk [of prosecution] to Americans is real,” Schaeffer Omer-Man told The Intercept. “But our primary goal is to get legal clarity that we can continue to have a working relationship with Francesca Albanese, and, equally if not more importantly, that we can resume working shoulder to shoulder with Palestinian civil society and human rights groups.”

The post Trump’s Sanctions Against the ICC Are Unconstitutional, Rights Groups Say appeared first on The Intercept.

Why Should Delaware Care?
After last year’s comprehensive reassessment of property, residential property carried more of New Castle County’s tax burden. That led critics to highlight a handful of commercial properties that were seemingly underassessed by tens of millions of dollars, shifting the burden to homeowners. A recent review by the county dramatically raised assessments on three of those properties.

Three of the most controversial properties from last year’s first-in-a-generation property reassessment have quietly increased by hundreds of millions of dollars in value – a change that could result in millions of dollars more for county and school district coffers.

Those properties – the massive Amazon warehouse near Newport, a newly-constructed Buccini Pollin Group apartment complex, and a downtown Wilmington parking garage owned by a banking giant – drew ire from residents and lawmakers alike as some of the biggest examples of a flawed reassessment process.

But legislation passed in January enabled New Castle County to reexamine some of these discrepancies. That review resulted in valuation jumps totaling nearly $346 million across the three properties. 

A spokesperson for New Castle County confirmed the assessed value changes of the three properties, but said she could not comment on any others that are currently undergoing a review.

The Amazon warehouse alone jumped to more than $372 million in assessed value, an increase of nearly 250%, or more than $260 million, from its prior assessment. 

The building was acquired by Macquarie, an Australian investment firm, four years ago for $392 million, a record for commercial real estate in Delaware. Amazon has a long-term lease for the building that could run decades, if fully executed.

A Spotlight Delaware analysis, using last year’s adjusted tax rates, found that Macquarie would have paid at least $2.5 million more in county and school taxes had its value been assessed at the higher value last fall. 

Some elected officials said the assessment changes show the state’s ongoing efforts to provide residents with property tax relief are working.

“It’s nice to see it coming into effect,” said Rep. Cyndie Romer, who has sponsored a number of property tax relief bills throughout this year’s legislative session. “We’re talking about changes that are significantly going to increase the tax base and potentially lower [taxes] for everybody, and that includes small business.”

But other local leaders cautioned that the impact of these updated property values on future tax bills may be blunted by other factors.

For the Christina School District, which includes the Buccini Pollin apartment complex and downtown Wilmington parking garage, the increased property values will be largely offset by decreasing assessments on residences resulting from New Castle Castle County’s ongoing appeals process. 

While assessment appeals and reviews remain ongoing, and numbers are subject to change, Christina’s Chief Financial Officer Bob Vacca said current data shows about a $600 million increase in non-residential property values and a $400 million decrease in residential values. 

A net increase of only $200 million in value, Vacca said, when leveraged against recent legislation that would lower tax rates on commercial properties, could mean that residential tax bills are not dramatically decreased as a result.

“It’s a convoluted mathematical equation that is not just a straight line,” Vacca told Spotlight Delaware. 

How much did property values change?

Along with the Amazon warehouse’s quarter-billion-dollar rise in value, two other contentious properties also dramatically increased.

The Press, a newly constructed 243-unit apartment complex off North Orange Street in downtown Wilmington, was valued last year at just more than $344,000. 

Now, the property built by the city’s biggest developer, Buccini Pollin Group, is valued at more than $61 million.

And while the apartment complex was the subject of criticism both on social media and by local officials, a representative from BPG told Spotlight Delaware the critiques were misplaced. 

“For people to suggest that a 20-story building, newly built in the city of Wilmington, is assessed at $344,000 is completely fallacious,” said Michael Hare, the vice president for development at BPG.

Since the building did not have a certificate of occupancy, Hare said, last year’s valuation was based only on land value, and not that of the building that sits on it. 

Hare said the company believes the $61 million valuation “seems higher” compared to other similar properties based on an internal review. He did not confirm whether the developer plans to appeal its updated value to the county, saying the company is evaluating the decision.

Another property, a downtown Wilmington parking garage owned by JPMorganChase, was valued last year at $416,000 – roughly the equivalent of a modest Wilmington-area, single-family home. 

The banking giant acquired the lot neighboring its Wilmington headquarters for $7 million in 2015 and spent an estimated $15 million to build a six-story, 703-space parking garage on the land. 

Its previous value was based on the market rate for parking garage rentals at the time it was assessed, according to previous Spotlight Delaware reporting.

Now, the garage is valued at more than $21 million dollars.

Representatives for both JPMorganChase and Macquarie did not respond to requests for comment on Tuesday.

Jacob Owens contributed to this report.

The post Amazon Boxwood plant assessment triples after review appeared first on Spotlight Delaware.

After Jonah’s longing gaze at a ballpark frank went viral, the Miami Marlins tracked him down and invited him back for a game full of treats.

Agents killed Joan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in Maine and Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Texas, even though both were not targets of enforcement action

US officials are facing mounting calls to remove US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from American streets after federal agents killed two men who were not the target of enforcement action in less than a week.

Advocacy groups, including the National Police Accountability Project and the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, described the fatal shootings of Joan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in Maine and Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Texas as extrajudicial killings.

Match officials are enforcing tweaks to the laws of the game that have hardly been tested. The results? Drama, ‘mistaken identities’ and lots of confusion

In the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes, the titular characters occasionally played a game known as Calvinball.

The rules were amorphous. At any moment, something like a “30-yard base wicket” may become part of the game. Determining a “winner” was besides the point, as the score for one game was given as “Q to 12.” The fictional, farcical sport entered public consciousness and was even cited by US supreme court justice Ketanji Brown Jackson in a blistering dissent last year.

The rich and famous who filed into the Kennedy Center’s opera house in December were there to enjoy one of the nation’s most exclusive celebrations of the performing arts: the center’s annual honors gala.

The black-tie event, hosted by President Donald Trump, prioritized tickets to people who donated more than $75,000 to the center. This year, it feted Hollywood icon Sylvester Stallone, the legendary glam rock band Kiss and the Grammy Award-winning disco pioneer Gloria Gaynor.

Among the attendees that evening were two lower-profile government officials whose regulatory decisions had been crucial to the future of the gala’s broadcast sponsor, CBS, and its parent company, Paramount.

Five months earlier, Federal Communications Commissioner Olivia Trusty cast a decisive vote approving Paramount’s historic $8 billion merger with Skydance Media. Now, the commissioner and a guest enjoyed the star-studded celebration thanks to tickets gifted to her by Paramount worth more than $12,000, according to ethics disclosure records obtained by ProPublica.

The other commissioner who approved the merger watched from a prized perch. FCC Chair Brendan Carr and his wife sat in a private skybox with Paramount CEO David Ellison and other executives from Paramount and CBS. Such seats sold for $125,000 a ticket, according to Kennedy Center guidelines.

It’s unclear if Paramount gifted Carr the premium seats because the FCC has yet to make public his financial disclosure for last year.

However, past disclosures show Carr and Trusty are among seven FCC commissioners who have accepted Kennedy gala tickets from CBS or its parent company over the last decade. Ethics experts told ProPublica this poses a blatant conflict of interest since the commission regulates the network. Carr’s previous financial statements show he has accepted tickets at least seven times since his 2017 appointment, totaling over $63,000 in gifts.

Last December’s ceremony attended by Trusty and Carr took place as Paramount was launching a hostile takeover bid for Warner Bros. Discovery, a move that would later result in a merger agreement that requires FCC approval.

Federal ethics rules ban employees from taking gifts from any entity that does business with, is regulated by or seeks official action from their agency.

Four ethics experts told ProPublica that by accepting the premium tickets Trusty and Carr compromised the FCC’s impartiality and should not take part in any upcoming decision on the merger.

“There’s no way that any top federal regulator should ever, ever accept a gift from a regulated company with interests their work will foreseeably affect,” said Walter Shaub, who led the federal Office of Government Ethics from 2013 to 2017. “The appearance of taking gifts like that is terrible. What’s at stake is nothing less than the public’s trust in government.”

Virginia Canter, who served as an ethics lawyer at the White House, Treasury Department, and Securities and Exchange Commission during the presidencies of George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama, said the commissioners who accepted tickets cannot participate in this matter without damaging the integrity of the government’s decision-making process.

“This is shocking. Pretty disturbing, that’s what I would say. I just don’t understand what they were thinking,” said Canter, who now works as chief counsel for ethics and corruption at the nonpartisan government watchdog group Democracy Defenders Fund.

The FCC’s review of the merger is one of the final hurdles facing a historic $110 billion consolidation of two of the five largest film studios in Hollywood. The deal would unite Paramount Skydance with Warner Bros., bringing under the control of one company Paramount+ and HBO Max streaming services; CBS and CNN; and scores of other major broadcast channels, cable networks, and digital platforms.

The new megacorporation, which could reshape how millions will access news, movies, sports and video games, faces fierce opposition from inside and outside Hollywood. More than 5,000 actors, producers and entertainment workers — including stars such as Robert De Niro, Javier Bardem, Joaquin Phoenix and Glenn Close — signed an open letter decrying how the consolidation would eliminate jobs and compromise “the integrity, independence, and diversity of our industry.”

On Monday, California, New York and 10 other Democratic states filed a lawsuit seeking to block the merger under federal and state anti-monopoly laws.

American and international regulators are evaluating the deal for its potential national security implications and impacts to consumers worldwide. Last week, the British government signaled it planned to investigate whether the new entertainment titan that would emerge from the union would unfairly stifle competition. The FCC’s ongoing review includes examining the Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds backing the deal, including from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Abu Dhabi.

The FCC usually has five commissioners — all appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate to serve five-year terms — but the agency currently has only three. Any vote by the full commission would likely be decided by Republicans Carr and Trusty over Democrat Anna Gomez. Gomez was not at the December 2025 show but has accepted tickets from Paramount in the past. Because the FCC requires a three-commissioner quorum for a vote, any recusal could leave the panel unable to decide on the merger. Carr could decide to ask staff to approve the deal rather than bring it to a commission vote, but the ethics experts said he should recuse himself from any decisions affecting the Paramount merger.

The experts warned the commissioners’ gifts might become central in legal challenges and said the Justice Department should investigate potential violations of federal rules or laws.

Neither Carr nor Trusty responded to ProPublica’s requests for comment. Gomez said in a statement that she followed agency advice when she attended the event in 2023 and 2024. Her statement did not elaborate or otherwise address why taking gifts from Paramount did not pose a conflict of interest.

An FCC spokesperson said agency ethics officers have for years cleared commissioner appearances, finding it consistent with ethics law.

“FCC Chairs and officials have attended the same event, in the same ways, consistently from the Trump Administration to the Biden Administration to the Obama Administration,” the FCC said in a statement. “There has been no change in recent years.”

Shaub called the justification outrageous.

“It’s no excuse to say that you took the gift because everyone else was doing it or that your agency has had a bad habit of indulging in gift taking for a long time,” Shaub said. “That kind of explanation doesn’t work for school children, and it sure as hell doesn’t work for government officials who are supposed to have better judgment than a fifth grader.”

Despite their oversight role, FCC members have long enjoyed a night out at the Kennedy Center courtesy of CBS or its parent company. Seven of the 10 commissioners who served since 2016 accepted tickets worth more than $260,000, according to a ProPublica analysis of ethics disclosures.

Carr’s predecessor, Jessica Rosenworcel, who was appointed FCC chair by President Joe Biden and stepped down in January 2025, attended regularly.

Rosenworcel and several other former commissioners who accepted the tickets did not respond to requests for comment. The one commissioner who didn’t accept a single gift, Nathan Simington, said he received the Kennedy Center invites from CBS and Paramount but turned them down because it “wasn’t my cup of tea.”

A review of 10 years of disclosures shows commissioners accepted paid trips from various sponsors to appear at banquets and speak at conferences. Some of those gifts came from other media companies regulated by the FCC. NBCUniversal, ABC-Disney and Fox News, for instance, paid for commissioners to attend White House Correspondents’ Association dinners, records show. The total value of the combined gifts topped $308,000. But the vast majority came from CBS and its parent company.

Melissa Zukerman, Paramount’s chief communications officer, said it was a decades-long “CBS practice to invite government officials from both parties” to the Kennedy Center show. She didn’t address why the practice continued after new ownership took over last year, the purpose of the gifts or whether the tickets posed a conflict of interest.

Carr, who joined the FCC as a staffer in 2012 and rose to become the agency’s general counsel, was appointed to serve as a commissioner by Trump during his first term. Since then, Carr has accepted tickets annually, except when the 2020 event was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to his public disclosures.

Carr did not respond to an email request from ProPublica for his latest ethics report, which would indicate whether Paramount also paid for him to attend last December’s gala. The FCC referred us to the Office of Government Ethics, which told us that the FCC had not yet provided the disclosure. The FCC did not respond to our subsequent requests for the record.

A 2009 Office of Government Ethics memo gave federal employees the right to attend Kennedy Center events but explicitly said officials cannot accept free attendance “offered by persons other than the Kennedy Center and its trustees, officers and employees.” In 2016, the ethics office tightened its gift requirements, warning officials to avoid any appearance “of loss of impartiality.”

There is an exemption to the gift rules that allows free entry to gatherings that are widely attended and paid for by third parties, but only if certain conditions are met.

The event must “further agency programs or operations,” and the agency’s interest in an official attending must outweigh “concern that the employee may be, or may appear to be, improperly influenced in the performance of official duties,” according to the federal rules.

As an example, the Office of Government Ethics said an industry-wide seminar attended by more than 100 people could be allowed if the employee’s participation would be in the agency’s interest. But those attending should “represent a range of persons interested in a given matter” and the event must provide a “structured opportunity” to exchange ideas and views among invitees.

The office clarified in a 2007 memo that performing arts presentations would not count even if they, like the honors gala, have a reception before or afterward at which officials can mingle with other attendees.

Canter, the former White House ethics lawyer, said it would be a “stretch” for the FCC to argue the exemptions apply to the Kennedy Center’s annual show, where famous musicians perform and celebrities laud those who are being honored. “It’s not what we would consider a widely attended gathering,” she said.

Kedric Payne, general counsel and senior director of ethics at the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan watchdog group, noted that federal rules also require agencies to weigh the market value of the attendance, its relevance to the agency, any sensitive pending matters involving the donor and whether accepting free tickets creates an appearance of preferential treatment.

“The ethics rules are designed to prevent this exact situation,” he said, adding that it is an “obvious conflict of interest” for an official to “accept expensive gifts from anyone with decisions pending before the agency. This matters because it makes the public question whether official decisions are free from the improper influence of wealthy special interests.”

An FCC official familiar with the legal guidance given to the commissioners said they were told the event met the criteria for the “widely attended gathering” exception. (The source was not authorized to talk publicly about agency legal discussions.)

Shaub, the former Office of Government Ethics head, disagreed, saying it would be “hard to understand what compelling interest the FCC could think it had in letting its commissioners” attend the gala.

“What possible reason could have outweighed the obvious ethics concerns?” he asked.

Federal rules require written authorization for an official to accept free entry to a widely attended gathering. The FCC did not respond to our requests to provide the authorizations for the Paramount tickets or say who authorized them. Two senior ethics officials at the agency, Kathleen Fulp and Lauren Northrop, did not respond to requests for comment.

While December’s event came at a particularly sensitive time for Paramount and the FCC, it wasn’t the first.

More than a year earlier, in September 2024, Paramount had filed paperwork seeking the commission’s approval for its merger with Skydance Media. A month later, the FCC launched an investigation of CBS after a conservative group complained about a “60 Minutes” interview with Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris. Trump later filed a lawsuit alleging the network deceptively edited the interview — an accusation CBS denied.

Then in November, less than two weeks after his election victory, Trump declared he would appoint Carr as FCC chair. Almost immediately, Carr accused CBS of biased election coverage and said it would be an obstacle to approving the Paramount-Skydance merger.

That December, Carr and three other commissioners — Rosenworcel, Gomez and Geoffrey Starks — accepted Kennedy Center gala tickets from Paramount worth a combined $48,156.

On Jan. 16, 2025, just days before Rosenworcel stepped down from the commission, she announced the agency was dismissing the election complaint against CBS. She and Gomez called the outcome a victory for the First Amendment.

But days later, Carr, the incoming FCC chair, reopened the investigation.

To resolve Trump’s lawsuit, CBS agreed to pay the president $16 million, a decision criticized by legal experts who decried Trump’s claims as baseless.

Two days after Trump posted on social media that he had received the settlement money, the FCC took up the Paramount-Skydance merger. To meet Carr’s demands, Paramount agreed to appoint an independent ombudsperson who would evaluate claims of bias. The company also pledged to eliminate its diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

By then, Starks and Simington had unexpectedly stepped down from the commission. Trusty, a Trump appointee, had been confirmed by the Senate the previous month.

Trusty and Carr voted in favor of the merger. Gomez voted against, blasting the approval for requiring “never-before-seen forms of government control over newsroom decisions and editorial judgment.”

Experts said that while Trusty had no conflict yet, Carr and Gomez did. The fact that Gomez voted against Paramount did not mean she didn’t face a conflict under the rules, Shaub said.

Federal rules only require those who accept improper gifts to make a prompt reimbursement, but Shaub and the other experts said Carr and Gomez should have abstained from the vote.

“If you repay the face value of the ticket, the gift rules don’t require you to recuse — though common sense and any kind of conscience might lead you to recuse voluntarily for the good of the country,” Shaub said. “But if you refuse to repay the donor, I don’t see how anything short of recusal could remotely remediate the problem.”

With the Paramount-Skydance merger greenlit by the FCC, Ellison, the new company’s CEO, then set his sights on acquiring Warner Bros. Discovery.

Warner at first rebuffed Paramount’s overtures and on Dec. 5 — two days before the Kennedy Center gala — accepted a bid from Netflix to buy its studio and streaming assets. Ellison responded by making numerous calls to administration officials and had a long talk with Trump, according to The Wall Street Journal.

On the night of the gala, Trump told reporters the Netflix deal “could be a problem” and that he planned to get directly involved with the regulatory approval. Inside the Kennedy Center, Carr and his wife sat with Ellison in an exclusive skybox, Bloomberg reported. (Gomez said in her statement to ProPublica that she declined Paramount’s “invitation because of serious concerns about press independence connected to conditions Paramount agreed to as part of its merger transaction before the FCC.”)

Hours after the gala ended, Paramount announced it was launching its hostile takeover bid of Warner Bros. Discovery.

About three months later, Carr publicly endorsed Paramount over Netflix on CNBC, promising swift approval.

If one or more commissioners choose to abstain from a merger vote because of ethical concerns, what would happen next is unclear. Under federal conflict of interest rules, an agency designee could theoretically permit commissioners to vote after considering several factors, including “the difficulty of reassigning the matter,” the nature of the relationship between the commissioners and Paramount, and the “effect that resolution of the matter would have upon the financial interests” of the firm.

Carr could bypass a full commission vote entirely, as he did with the recent acquisition of Tegna by Nexstar Media Group. In that case, Carr delegated authority to FCC staff to approve the takeover.

But any decision on the Paramount deal — whether by the full commission or by staff at the direction of the chair — is likely to be challenged.

Richard Painter, a former White House ethics attorney in the administration of George W. Bush, said while courts often defer to the government’s judgment, they also can become skeptical if a regulatory agency is shown to have violated ethics rules.

“A judge may very well say that the merger decision of the FCC isn’t worth jack because the process was corrupted,” he said.

The post FCC Officials Took Pricey Gifts From Paramount as the Company Needed Approval for Billion-Dollar Deals appeared first on ProPublica.

The British ally of President Donald Trump wanted a vote of confidence. Instead, other parties dumped their campaigns, and a comedian stepped in.

An anti-corruption probe in Iraq leads to seizure of 825 pounds of gold and tens of millions in cash from lawmakers and government officials.

One person died and three were missing in San Francisco Bay on Tuesday after a boat with 20 people on board sank near Alcatraz Island, authorities said.

Canadian scientists visit remains of polar exploration vessels in ‘golden era for shipwreck investigating’

Moments after devouring the final glimmers of light, the seafloor offered nothing but darkness and silt. Then the bow appeared.

More than 1,000ft (305 metres) below the surface of the Labrador Sea, off the coast of Canada, the skeleton of the final ship used by the famed polar explorer Ernest Shackleton appeared in its silty grave.

Police say suspect stole three-and-a-half-month-old tuxedo kitten Magnolia before attempting to rob a PNC bank

Law enforcement agencies are accustomed to dealing with cat burglars – but now a Maryland police department is saying it grappled with a cat-wielding bank robber.

The Prince George’s county police department said its officers arrested a man suspected of stealing a cat and then taking the animal with him to a PNC bank branch in the local community of Beltsville to rob the establishment on Monday morning.

Your dishwasher losing oomph may be your fault. Here's what experts say is the number one cause of dishwasher decline.

Why Should Delaware Care?
A recent police shooting of a 19-year-old has quickly become one of the highest-profile use-of-force cases in Wilmington in years. The incident has sparked growing calls for transparency around what happened and renewed pressure for broader reforms to policing in the city.

Three weeks after a Wilmington police officer shot 19-year-old Kadir Skinner, several City Council members renewed calls for Mayor John Carney to conduct an external audit of the city police.

They made the calls during a council meeting Monday, where members expressed frustration with what they claimed was a lack of action taken by the Carney administration regarding police reform. 

The council members pointed to a resolution they passed a month before Skinner had been killed that urged city officials to hire auditors to conduct an independent assessment of police policies and procedures. 

“It is sad that we have to wait for a tragedy to happen for people to want to take action, but I do want you to know in the six years I’ve been here, there has been a push,” Councilwoman Shané Darby said at Monday’s meeting.  

In a statement to Spotlight Delaware, Caroline Klinger, a spokeswoman for the mayor, did not say whether the city would initiate an external police audit, but described the idea as an “important and worthwhile discussion.” 

She also referenced community safety initiatives the city has implemented, and noted that police policies and procedures are currently publicly available.  

“We believe an initiative of this scope should be grounded in clear engagement with all relevant stakeholders, including council members and others, and aligned with the broader strategic vision for the city,” Klinger stated. 

Also speaking at the Monday council meeting was a community advocate who referenced a recently released video showing nine minutes of the aftermath of the Skinner shooting. The video begins with the teen lying on the ground with an officer on top, cuffing his arms. In the video, Skinner can be heard saying, “I can’t breathe.”

The advocate, Lanita Brooks, called the video very upsetting.

Had it been widely viewed by the public prior to a public rally for Skinner on Sunday, Brooks said, “it would not have been a peaceful march.”

Wilmington officials have said that officers were in the northeast portion of the city on June 24 when they saw Skinner leave a house and point a gun toward a crowd of people. A foot chase ensued, they said. It ended with Skinner shot in the buttocks, police said. 

Harry Daniels, an attorney retained by Skinner’s family who watched body camera footage from the shooting, said Skinner was running from a dog, and never turned to face officers before police fired three or four shots.

A woman who witnessed the shooting previously told Spotlight Delaware she saw Skinner running with his hands raised as officers chased him. She said that she did not see anything in his hands.

Demands for a release of the body cam

About 50 people had attended the Sunday rally at Rodney Square that featured a series of speakers condemning the police shooting of Skinner. 

Several also criticized local elected officials for not speaking publicly about the incident. During one moment of the rally, one speaker turned to police officers watching from their vehicles and led demonstrators in a chant of “Officer, bring us the shooter.” 

The rally marked the latest in weeks of outcry from community members, local activists, and city council members who have called on authorities to release more information about the killing of Skinner. 

At the center of the demands are calls for authorities to release body camera footage from the officer who shot and killed Skinner, and to publicly name that officer.

The scrutiny of Wilmington police echoes public responses to past controversial police shootings in the city and in New Castle County, including the 2015 killing of Jeremy McDole, who was shot while in a wheelchair, and the 2021 killing of Lymond Moses.

A spokesman for the Delaware Department of Justice, which is investigating the shooting, said on Monday his office is “on track for an expedited release” of the body camera footage.

“We are doing everything in our power to expedite the release of body-worn camera footage without compromising the investigation,” the spokesman Mat Marshall said. 

Experts present data, framework for police reform

Darby had scheduled the Monday meeting of the City Council’s intergovernmental committee in response to the shooting of Skinner. 

During the meeting, national civil rights consultant Carlton Mayers proposed a framework for auditing the Wilmington Police Department that he said would give residents who live in high-crime and historically over-policed neighborhoods a voice in the formation of police practices, such as stops, use of force, and surveillance.

The method would use anonymous, real-time polling taken from community listening sessions, followed by an auditor’s review of police policies, training, supervision, and hiring practices. Mayers said he has employed that framework in assessments of police in Nashville and Milwaukee.

Following Mayers’ presentation, another national policing expert addressed the council. 

Samuel Sinyangwe, founder of Police Scorecard, shared data his organization collects that he said showed Wilmington police shooting people at higher rates than comparable cities, while also arresting Black residents for low-level offenses at roughly three times the rate of white residents. 

He also said the data shows Wilmington residents spend more on policing per capita than 99% of those in similarly sized cities, while also facing more fines and forfeitures. The city also pays out more in misconduct settlements than comparable cities, he said. 

The city’s budget for 2027 allocated more than $71 million dollars to the police department, a 4.6% increase from last year.

City council members present at the meeting included Darby, Coby Owens, Christian Willauer, Latisha Bracy, and Council President Ernest “Trippi” Congo. Wilmington Police Chief Wilfredo Campos also attended virtually. 

Darby said Carney administration officials declined to attend the meeting.

Also present at the meeting was Skinner’s family, including his father, Durrell Dollard; his mother, Rashai Skinner; and his sister, Aniyah Clark. 

The post City Council calls for audit of Wilmington police, following Skinner shooting appeared first on Spotlight Delaware.

The House voted 308-117 to pass the Sunshine Protection Act, which would make daylight saving time permanent nationwide and end the twice-yearly clock change. The bill faces an uncertain future in the Senate, "where one G.O.P. leader said it was unclear whether it could move ahead and at least one Republican appears inclined to try to block it," reports The New York Times. Some sleep experts oppose permanent daylight saving time, arguing that year-round standard time better aligns with circadian rhythms and winter morning safety. The New York Times reports: President Trump has championed the effort to save an extra hour of daylight before nightfall and make the time zone permanent, describing the ritual of moving clocks forward in the spring and back in the fall a "ridiculous, twice yearly production." "We are going with the far more popular alternative, Saving Daylight, which gives you a longer, brighter Day," Mr. Trump wrote in a social media post in May. "And who can be against that." A sizable bloc of Florida Republicans in Congress is leading the charge on legislation that would do just that, mandating daylight saving time nationwide for the entire year. Representative Vern Buchanan of the Tampa Bay area is backing the bill, and Representative Anna Paulina Luna, another Tampa Bay-area Republican, cosponsored it. House leaders agreed to allow a vote on the measure this week as a sweetener for Ms. Luna in their efforts to persuade her to lift a legislative blockade she had maintained as she sought to force Senate action on a voting restriction bill Mr. Trump has championed.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

PM lays out plan for datacentre development and rejects prospect tech companies will be given free use of Australian data

• Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

Anthony Albanese has promised “the strongest possible protection” for Australian creatives against misuse of their work by artificial intelligence models, warning it would be “theft” if writers, artists and musicians didn’t have control of their work or receive payment for its use.

Amid growing community concern about large energy-intensive datacentres, the federal government will also set strict new rules for the facilities, including where they can be built, that they shouldn’t compete for land with housing, their power and water use, and that they don’t increase electricity prices for consumers.

EV owners were sent hefty PCNs but say some signs in private car parks fail to warn of fees to park and recharge car

Does refuelling your car class as parking? The answer appears to be yes if it’s an electric vehicle. Guardian Money has been contacted by several readers who were fined after charging their cars away from home.

The motorists report being caught out by signs that fail to make clear that charging points are subject to parking tariffs or to store opening times. Also, they have found some chargers being advertised as available for use when it would be a breach of the car park’s terms and conditions to use them.

Begode Mten5 Review. When I first jumped into the world of electric unicycles (EUCs), I started with the Begode Mten4. After logging 1500 km on that little wheel, the tire finally gave out due to uneven wear. Rather than replace the tire, I decided to level up to the Begode Mten5.

The Truth About the Begode Mten5: An Honest Owner’s Review

This review is about my experience with the Mten5, from ordering to trail riding, and how it stacks up against its smaller sibling.

Ordering & Delivery

I ordered the Mten5 directly from Begode’s website. The checkout was smooth, and the wheel arrived in just under two weeks, fast for a direct shipment from China. No hidden fees, and the packaging was solid, protecting the wheel during transit. The whole process felt as seamless as any domestic order.

Unboxing My Mten5 – Video

A quick walk-through of the box contents, the wheel, charger, and a few accessories. The video shows the sleek matte finish of the Mten5 and the aggressive pedal design right out of the box.

First Ride Impressions

Out of the box, the Mten5 feels solid. The 11-inch tire was uninflated, so I added air for my first ride, but within a few kilometres, I noticed a slow leak. A quick application of Slime tire sealant solved the issue, and the tire has held pressure perfectly afterward. The wheel’s weight is noticeable, slightly heavier than the Mten4, but the extra mass translates into a more stable ride at higher speeds. The built-in carry handle makes lifting easy when I need to load the wheel or haul it around. The clear LED dashboard shows speed, battery percentage, and ride distance at a glance without having to pull out the app on my phone.

Begode Mten5 Review Off-Road Capabilities – VIDEO

Begode does not market the Mten5 as an off‑road beast; it’s built for pavement and light trails. However, most of my riding has been on forest paths, grass, and gravel roads, and the Mten5 handles them impressively well. The low centre of gravity and powerful  1200W motor give it plenty of torque to climb moderate hills. The only real weakness is mud or slick surfaces, as the road‑specific tyre slips a bit when the ground gets soggy. For dry or packed terrain, it’s surprisingly capable.

Mten5 vs Mten4

If you’ve ever ridden the Mten4, you’ll instantly feel the difference. The Mten4 feels like a nimble, twitchy scooter, quick to lean and effortless to carve. The Mten5, by contrast, feels more “locked‑in.” The road-slick wheel and increased inertia demand a more deliberate input to initiate a turn, yet it remains remarkably nimble for its size. The trade‑off is a more stable platform at speed, which I appreciate on longer rides.

Begode Mten5 Review – Final Thoughts

The Begode Mten5 is a fantastic upgrade for anyone moving up from a smaller EUC. It offers a comfortable, stable ride, handles a variety of terrain (provided it’s not overly muddy), and the direct‑order experience was hassle‑free. A small tire leak was the only hiccup, and Slime fixed it in minutes. If you’re after a versatile daily commuter that can occasionally venture off the beaten path, the Mten5 is well worth considering.

Share Your Thoughts 

Do you have experience with the Begode Mten5?  Have some knowledge to share? Drop a comment on my socials. FB IG YT

More From the Sideways Movement 

We Review More Of Our Favorite Shred Machines

• Jackrabbit XG Review
• Razor Crazy Cart Review
• Exploring the Begode Mten4
• Onewheel XR Review

Insta360 Camera Reviews

• Insta360 X3
• Go Insta360 Go

As always, thank you for reading. Please follow our socials for more Onewheel Psych Juice.

Now go out and ride!

The Sideways Movement – Onewheel Blog – thesidewaysmovement.com

The post Begode Mten5 Review appeared first on The Sideways Movement.

Officials set up traps and electric fences after 14 break-ins recored in one town in two weeks, amid fears of a repeat offender

Authorities are searching for a bear that sneaked into the home of an elderly couple and raided their fridge amid concerns it may be behind 14 break-ins across a Japanese town in the past fortnight.

On Monday evening, Mitsuo Matsubara, 87, was confronted by a large Asiatic black bear when he went to investigate a noise in his kitchen. His fridge was open, and food was strewn across the floor. His wife called the police.

• Cease and bullpen combine for three-hitter

• Bellinger named MVP after two-run single

• AL record first All-Star shutout since 2013

Dylan Cease struck out the side in the first inning, combining with 10 relievers on a three-hitter in a show of pitching dominance that led the American League to a 4-0 win over the National League in Tuesday night’s All-Star Game.

All-Star MVP Cody Bellinger hit a two-run single and Ben Rice followed with an RBI single in the first against Cristopher Sánchez of the host Philadelphia Phillies.

Every ICE arrest team will have at least one law enforcement officer equipped with a body-worn camera going forward, DHS said Tuesday, after two fatal shootings by agents who didn't have cameras.

Beijing’s risky bet against the West.

Many people assume they'll inherit a loved one's debt, but the rules are far more nuanced than you may realize.

This time, anti-Americanism is different.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: The Iranian government abused well-known vulnerabilities in the global telecoms infrastructure to locate U.S. military personnel in the build-up to the Iran War, as well as in the early days of the conflict, according to Financial Times. The Iranian government exploited Signaling System 7, or SS7, a set of protocols for 2G and 3G networks that has long been the backbone of how cellular networks connect to each other to route subscribers' calls and texts around the world, the newspaper reported, citing research by the Mobile Surveillance Monitor, as well as anonymous government officials with knowledge of the spy campaign. Intelligence agencies have long abused SS7 to track cellphones abroad, which is what happened in this campaign. Using this technique, Iran was reportedly able to locate U.S. military forces stationed in military bases as well as hotels in Iraq, Bahrain, and other countries in the Middle East, which allowed the regime to strike them. These attacks resulted in several injuries. Apart from SS7, Iran also abused advertising technology used to serve tailored ads to cellphone users, another well-known surveillance technique that relies on everyday technology.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

This blog is closed. You can read our latest full report here

Resurgent oil and fuel prices could cement a fourth interest rate rise in Australia this year if Donald Trump’s renewed conflict with Iran is not resolved within a week, economists warn.

US missile strikes on Iran and Trump’s announcement of a new maritime blockade has lifted oil prices to their highest point in the month since the two countries agreed to a peace deal.

Bloomberg’s editor-in-chief, John Micklethwait, stands by reporting, saying ministers who sued ‘imposed an extremely strained meaning on what was a solid ​story’

Bloomberg News and one of its reporters have been ordered to pay S$460,000 (US$355,734) in damages after an article it published was found to have defamed two Singapore government ministers, the city-state’s high court said in a judgment released on Tuesday.

Bloomberg and the reporter, Low De Wei, are liable to jointly pay S$230,000 to each minister, comprising S$170,000 in general damages and S$60,000 in aggravated damages, ⁠the judgment said.

This live blog is now closed.

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email

Konstantin Sokolov, a Russian-born private equity investor in Chicago, will serve as chairman of a new state department enterprise fund overseeing more than $200m designated for a central Asia trade corridor, including investments in transportation, energy infrastructure and critical minerals, the Guardian has learned.

The state department confirmed his appointment on Friday.

A home security camera captured the sound of five gunshots when Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a Colombian national, was fatally shot by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer.

The measure also allows states to opt out if they take action before the federal law is enacted.

In a match Tuesday featuring two of soccer's biggest heavyweights, Spain put in a masterful performance, frustrating France to the tune of a 2-0 win to advance to Sunday's World Cup final​.

The Wisconsin Elections Commission found billionaire Elon Musk may have violated the state's election bribery law by offering $1 million checks to voters during an election last year.

The device is expected to possess a "personality" that will serve as a "humanlike AI companion," Bloomberg reports.

Lawsuit filed by dozens of employees says people who took maternity or disability leave were disproportionately selected for layoffs

Dozens of Meta employees have sued the social media company over claims that it used artificial intelligence tools to tag workers for mass layoffs. The workers allege that those AI tools targeted them after they asked for protected or maternity leave or disability accommodation.

The lawsuit, filed Monday in federal court in the northern district of California, points to Meta’s workforce reduction of about 8,000 employees earlier this year. Meta is the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. The suit alleges that Meta used a “constellation of internal artificial intelligence systems”, including AI performance ratings and keystroke- and activity-monitoring data, to pinpoint who to lay off.

‘Boston cone’ arrives to fanfare in first-class seat from Glasgow before planned trip to raise money for mental health

Fresh off its first-class flight from Glasgow, it received a reception befitting a visiting dignitary: a bagpiper in full regalia playing inside Boston Logan international airport. Waiting to greet it were diplomats, the governor and Boston’s mayor.

The guest of honor? An orange traffic cone.

Haiku has another buy month of development activity to detail, and there’s a big ticket item this time, even if the developers themselves don’t consider it so.

The thing that should be the biggest news item this month is that the GSoC 2024 work to port “NVMM”, the NetBSD Virtual Machine Monitor (which runs on more than just NetBSD, despite the name), providing hardware-accelerated virtualization support for QEMU, was finally merged. Unfortunately it still doesn’t fully work, so it’s still disabled by default: hence, it’s only a minor news item, unfortunately.

↫ waddlesplash on Haiku’s website

It may not work due to – so far – not well-understood problems causing any complex virtualised operating system to crash in a variety of ways, but since these problems seem related not to NVMM but Haiku itself, I still think this is a big piece of news. If the problems can be addressed, Haiku will have proper virtualisation, which is crazy to think about. There’s a forum thread in case you wish to help out with this effort.

Other than this major news, there’s the usual list of small fixes and changes, including preliminary work on USB Ethernet support, which, when working, could be very welcome news for people whose onboard Ethernet doesn’t work with Haiku. The team also believes a beta 6 might actually be released this August, but once again I’d like to underline that Haiku’s nightlies work just fine, and you really don’t need to wait for a beta.

Commons health committee also recommends end to junk food advertising on billboards and public transport

Fast food chains such as KFC should be stopped from opening near schools, and advertising for junk food on billboards and public transport should be banned to help curb obesity, MPs will say today.

The Commons health committee will also urge ministers to stop giving in to food industry lobbying and get tough to tackle a problem that costs the UK £74bn a year and causes huge illness.

Supermarkets should be forced to display fruit and vegetables prominently, for example near entrances and checkouts, to help boost sales.

All food must start carrying front-of-pack, traffic light-style labels telling consumers how healthy or unhealthy they are, which some supermarket chains already use.

The government should urgently progress its previously announced intention to compel food producers to reveal what percentage of their sales come from healthy and unhealthy products.

Ministers should “be more courageous [and start] standing up to challenge from industry”, which often seeks to delay the introduction of measures to limit bad diet.

Annual State of the UK Climate analysis finds last four years in UK are in top five hottest on record

The UK’s climatic extremes are becoming increasingly normal, a report has found, with last year the hottest on record and further “unprecedented changes” likely to break the record again soon.

Data stretching back to 1884 shows the UK has never experienced a year as hot as 2025, according to the annual State of the UK Climate report, with temperatures pushed to dizzying heights by carbon pollution clogging the atmosphere.

I visited Samsung's secret display lab to see what our future smartphones could look like. It was the first time the press has been allowed in.

During a visit to South Korea, I was among the first people outside of Samsung to see how the company stress tests its foldable displays before they end up in your pocket.

OpenAI is reportedly developing a screen-free, portable smart speaker meant to act as a personalized home computer and humanlike AI companion. "It will help control smart-home appliances, play media, answer questions, respond to messages and tap into the range of capabilities offered by OpenAI's ChatGPT," reports Bloomberg, citing people familiar with the matter. The device, expected to be unveiled this year and released in 2027, would mark OpenAI's first major hardware push after acquiring Jony Ive's io Products. Bloomberg reports: Apple sued OpenAI last week, accusing the company of stealing trade secrets. But OpenAI believes that the device veers significantly from anything Apple has on the market today and that it's unlikely that it violates trade secrets belonging to the iPhone maker, the people said. OpenAI's success in hardware will hinge on bringing a novel approach to the market -- something it aims to do with the smart speaker. For instance, the device's technology is meant to become increasingly personalized and proactive as it gains a deeper understanding of its owner over time, according to the people. OpenAI envisions the device anticipating needs, surfacing information proactively and serving as an expert on its user, they said. Though the speaker is designed to stay in the home, it will be easy to move around the house. OpenAI believes the product's defining feature will be its personality and ability to connect on a humanlike level with users. The speaker incorporates mechanical elements that can move on their own, creating a sense that it is alive and not just an object responding to commands. The machine also will draw on personal information such as emails to better understand its owner. The goal is for the device to feel like a companion and become a physical manifestation of OpenAI's ChatGPT. Still, the exact plans could change as the company works through the development and legal process. The device's communication abilities will rely on a more advanced version of the ChatGPT Voice Mode -- GPT-Live -- that OpenAI rolled out this month. The new voice mode is designed to act more like a human. It can listen and talk at the same time, adapt more naturally during conversations, and quickly process information. Though the new product resembles a speaker, OpenAI internally describes it as the first of its kind: a computer built for AI to help make busy people more productive. It includes a camera and other sensors that help it understand a user's surroundings and context, as well as advanced AI models beyond those available on conventional smart speakers. Another central difference is that the device includes a rechargeable battery, allowing it to be carried from room to room throughout the day. A user could bring it into the laundry room while doing chores, move it into the kitchen for cooking assistance, and later place it in a living room or bedroom to have it play music. It can also remain plugged into a single room if the customer chooses.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

I have yet to see any of these creepy camera glasses Facebook (and a few other companies) are selling. One of the many benefits of living in Arctic Sweden, where people are reserved, keep their their distance, and try not to draw attention to themselves, is that new technology fads don’t really permeate society here. The odds of me spotting one of these creepy predator glasses in my remote town are incredibly slim, and to me, that’s a feature, not a bug.

Meanwhile, in places where these creepy things can actually be found in the wild, a backlash is thankfully growing.

Will Kujawa, a freelance video producer, said that he has been thinking about buying a pair of Meta glasses with prescription lenses to film behind the scenes content during his shoots, but the online backlash has given him second thoughts. He says he was “blown away by how mean some of the people were” in response to his social media posts about considering buying a pair.

“I saw all these comments about if you wear those glasses you’re basically a predator or a creep, and I was like, ‘oh, maybe it’s not a good idea to have those,'” he told Engadget. But he says he understands why people have concerns. “I didn’t really think that through all the way … there are a lot of times where it’s not appropriate to wear cameras on your face. And even though I would have no intention of do[ing] anything creepy with them, it didn’t even occur to me [that] other people just assume that automatically.”

↫ Karissa Bell at Engadget

I can maybe see a use for these things in specific professional environments, but even then, obviously not ones made by Facebook, one of the, if not the creepiest companies in technology history. If I were to see anyone out here in the real world using one these things, I, too, would automatically assume that the guy (statistically speaking) wearing them is a creep. I can only imagine what the people most often targeted by creepy men would think encountering some rando wearing these.

Clearly, these things should be made illegal outside of specific professional environments where they could potentially be useful. While it’s impossible to stop tools like these from making their way into the hands of creeps, it at least provides the justice system with a clear method of nailing them to the wall. They didn’t get Al Capone for any of his violent crimes – they nailed him for tax evasion.

Fire broke out last Thursday in the southeastern province of Almería, which is home to many foreign residents

Seven Britons are among 12 foreign nationals killed in wildfires in southern Spain, authorities said.

Officials said 12 of the 13 victims were foreign nationals after completing postmortem examinations after the fires that swept through Andalusia.

In what should be a surprise to absolutely nobody, Microsoft assigns a persistent identifier to every Windows installation, tying it to its user, and the company has no issues handing it over to law enforcement. Abhijith M B at windows Latest dove into the details, and it’s just as bad as you would expect.

Am I glad Stokes got caught? Yes, without hesitation. Thirty-five pages of a teenager bragging about diamond chains spelling out “HACK THE PLANET” while extorting a jewelry store don’t leave much room for sympathy, whatever role Microsoft’s telemetry played in building the case.

But that doesn’t make the GDID okay. Every company selling you software has some version of this, and a persistent device identity is a reasonable thing to build into activation and fraud systems. What gets me is that most people had never come across the term GDID before a federal court filing such as this. Microsoft wrote one sentence about it in an Azure Monitor reference table meant for enterprise IT admins pulling update reports, not for the 1.6 billion or so regular people whose PCs are generating this data.

You might be tech savvy enough to turn off Activity History, pick a local account, and strip out every scrap of optional telemetry, but none of it changes the fact that the identifier exists, and that it answers to your Microsoft Account instead of you. Microsoft only told the public about it once a court forced the issue.

↫ Abhijith M B at windows Latest

The thing is, even without this GDID, I can’t imagine Microsoft would have much trouble tying a Windows installation to a specific user. Consequently, I’m afraid the following is going to happen: this story gains even more traction, Microsoft removes the GDID, and everyone thinks the problem is resolved. Of course, in reality, any one of the hundreds of other metrics and data Microsoft collects can and will still be used in the exact same way as this GDID thing in this case.

If my experiences with Windows 11 weren’t clear enough – don’t use Windows. Just don’t.

Clarence Frazier Jr charged with murder over killing of Drew Hanson and could face death penalty if convicted

A federal agent was fatally shot while trying to help authorities capture a man who failed to show up to his sexual battery trial in Louisiana, according to the US justice department.

Clarence Frazier Jr, 48, was charged with murder in the killing of deputy US marshal Drew Hanson, authorities said. Frazier could face life imprisonment or the death penalty if he is eventually convicted of murdering Hanson.

Rae Walberg of WWL Louisiana, a Guardian reporting partner, contributed

Google Images is getting a Pinterest-like redesign that turns image search into a personalized discovery feed, with "For You" galleries, real-time updates, and collections for saving visual ideas. "Google is also adding a way for users to create AI images right in Search, as it celebrates 25 years since the debut of Google Images," reports TechCrunch. From the report: After navigating to the redesigned Google Images, users will see a "For You" gallery of images tailored to their interests and browsing history. Like Pinterest, the gallery is designed for continuous browsing, with Google saying it updates in real time with new images. As users browse, they can save ideas to their "collections," which will appear as tabs above the main gallery of photos. For example, users can create collections for things like vacation outfit ideas, travel inspiration, and ways to design a reading nook, which they can come back to later. [...] As for generating images directly in Search, Google says the feature is meant for moments when you have a highly specific idea for an image that doesn't already exist online. Google is bringing image generation directly into AI Overviews on Search and will use its latest Nano Banana model to transform a text prompt into a custom visual. The feature can also help users reimagine spaces and visualize ideas, such as seeing what a room might look like painted red or what a dorm room with a coastal theme could look like.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Sunshine Protection Act has bipartisan support, including backing of Trump and some Democratic co-sponsors, and will head to the Senate next

The US House of Representatives on Tuesday voted overwhelmingly to approve a bill that would end the practice of changing clocks twice a year and make daylight saving time permanent.

The bid to end clock-changing, dubbed the Sunshine Protection Act, has bipartisan support, including the backing of Donald Trump and some Democratic co-sponsors. Following the 308-117 tally in the House, the bill next goes to the Senate.

Elena Kagan and Amy Coney Barrett appear before House lawmakers in rare testimony to ask for more protection

Supreme court justice Amy Coney Barrett told House lawmakers that a sharp rise in threats against her and other justices is increasingly affecting her personal and family lives.

Barrett and fellow supreme court justice Elena Kagan made the case for increased security in rare House testimony to discuss the court’s budget request. The last time a sitting justice answered questions on Capitol Hill was 2019.

Spain grandly swatted aside strangely subdued France to reach Sunday’s final

France and Spain have only met once before at the World Cup. That was 20 years ago, back in the day when Les Bleus very much had La Roja’s number (the Euro 84 final, the Euro 2000 quarters, all that).

Spain have had the better of the tournament football since. Wins in the Euro 2012 quarters and the Euro 2024 semis, plus an absurd 5-4 victory in last year’s Nations League semis. France did win the 2021 Nations League final, though.

‘Enchanted’ visitors queued for hours to see two of largest – and smelliest – plants flower in San Marino

Two corpse flowers have bloomed at a southern California research institution, where thousands of visitors had the rare chance to watch two of the world’s largest – and most odorous – plants flowering at the same time.

The two titan arums, named Odorysseus and Odora, attracted more than 7,000 people on Monday at the Huntington library, art museum and botanical gardens in San Marino, about 12 miles from downtown Los Angeles, after they bloomed over the weekend.

Los Angeles is letting its contract with the controversial security company expire after a three-year partnership.

Your Xbox controller can make or break your gaming experience. I’ve tested the best wired and wireless options available, and here are our top picks.

Gov. Kathy Hochul signs an executive order to pause new construction, but it won't affect data centers that have already broken ground.

Midnight to 6am block on some apps is latest stage of Labour’s bid to protect young people from online harms

Sixteen and 17-year-olds are to be encouraged to observe a midnight social media curfew, in the latest stage of Labour’s bid “to protect the next generation” from online harms, including poor sleep caused by night-time scrolling.

From next spring, Britain’s oldest children will be urged to refrain from using certain apps with a midnight to 6am block being switched on by default. But the curfew will not be mandatory and can be overridden. The move is an extension of the under-16 social media ban announced last month, which included restrictions on platforms such as Snapchat, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and X.

S26 Ultra owners have claimed on Reddit that they've noticed discoloration.

House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, calls amendment ‘overly broad’ as party grapples with backlash over Israel

• US politics live – latest updates

Top House Democrats split on Tuesday over a proposal to block aid for Israel’s military, with two of the party’s highest-ranking lawmakers saying they will oppose the effort while the chair of the progressive caucus encouraged his colleagues to back the defunding.

The debate over an amendment introduced by Republican congressman Thomas Massie to halt $3.3bn in aid for Israel – the majority of which would go to its military – comes as Democrats grapple with a rebellion among their voters over the party’s support for the Middle Eastern ally, which has fueled the defeats of a series of congressional incumbents in recent primaries.

Death of unidentified 28-year-old man marks third immigration enforcement-related death in one week

A person died during an encounter with federal immigration officials on Tuesday morning in Florida, a state highway patrol spokesperson confirmed, marking the third death in one week linked to immigration enforcement operations.

Officials with Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), which is a component of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), had an “encounter” with four men in a vehicle in the parking lot of a convenience store along a busy road in St Augustine, Florida, the highway patrol spokesperson said. As the four men fled from the agents, one of them ran into the busy road and was struck by a semi truck. The person died at the scene.

A lawsuit from 26 Meta employees alleges the company used AI-driven scoring and monitoring systems to select workers for layoffs, disproportionately targeting employees with disabilities or those who had taken protected medical, family, pregnancy, or parental leave. "Meta did not assemble the termination list through the considered judgment of managers who knew the work. Instead, Meta used a constellation of internal artificial-intelligence systems -- including a system referred to internally as 'Metamate,' employee-trained 'second-brain' agents, keystroke- and activity-monitoring data, AI-token-usage dashboards, and algorithmically assisted performance ranking and calibration -- to score, rank, and select employees for inclusion on the list," the lawsuit (PDF) said. Ars Technica reports: Employees were allegedly graded, among other things, on how much they used Meta's AI tools. "Meta's internal dashboards classified employees by their stage of adoption of its artificial-intelligence tools, using categories such as 'AI Native,' 'AI First,' and 'AI Enabled,'" the lawsuit said. The lawsuit is apparently "the first against a major U.S. company to challenge the alleged use of AI in conducting layoffs," according to Reuters. The complaint alleges that Meta's tools for monitoring employees did not account for differences caused by disabilities and protected leaves. "Those tools draw on inputs -- performance ratings, calibration scores, productivity and output metrics, 'AI-native' ratings, and AI-token consumption -- that, by design, cannot be accumulated by an employee who is on protected medical or family leave, or whose output is reduced by a disability," the lawsuit said. The lawsuit alleged that Meta management did not take steps to adjust scores for employees who took leave or who requested reasonable accommodations for disabilities. "Meta did not neutralize those inputs for protected leave; did not exclude protected-leave-takers or accommodation-seekers from the selection cohort; and did not pause the system for the individualized, leave- and accommodation-neutral review that the law requires," the complaint alleged. "The result was that employees who took protected leaves were disproportionately selected for layoff, based on scoring that not only failed to account for their protected leaves, but in effect penalized the employees for exercising their legal rights to these leaves." The 26 plaintiffs requested leaves or disability accommodations in the 24 months before being selected for layoffs, the lawsuit said. The layoffs are not yet finalized, but employees are scheduled to start losing their jobs on July 22, the lawsuit said. "These claims lack merit and are not based on facts," said Meta in a statement. "Workforce management and organizational decisions were and are made by people, not AI."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Lindsey Graham’s younger sister appointed by South Carolina’s governor three days after senator’s death

• Darline Graham Nordone: Lindsey Graham’s sister and interim US senator

Darline Graham, the sister of the late Republican senator Lindsey Graham, was sworn in to temporarily fill his Senate seat on Tuesday, just three days after his sudden death.

Graham was appointed by Henry McMaster, South Carolina’s governor, to fill the remainder of her brother’s current term.

Darline was 13 when her brother became her legal guardian – and was a key presence as he rose in the Republican ranks

When Lindsey Graham was in college, his parents died, just over a year apart. But he worried most about his sister, who, at 13, was suddenly an orphan. Graham became her legal guardian – and later adopted her so she could receive his benefits through his service as an air force lawyer.

On Tuesday, following Graham’s sudden death, that sister, Darline Graham, was sworn in to serve the remainder of her late brother’s Senate term. “Lindsey took care of his little sister in years long departed,” Henry McMaster, South Carolina’s Republican governor, said at a press conference on Monday convened at the state capital in Columbia. “It’s my honor to ask his little sister, Darline Graham, to finish his work for him now.”

The scheme begins with fake fraud alerts before shifting to a FaceTime call, where victims are tricked into exposing sensitive banking information.

July 14, 2026 — As part of its 36th large-scale call, the Gauss Centre for Supercomputing (GCS) is now accepting applications for GCS Large-Scale Projects covering the period from November 1, 2026, to October 31, 2027.

The three centers that comprise the Gauss Centre for Supercomputing (GCS)—the High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart (HLRS), Jülich Supercomputing Centre (JSC), and Leibniz Supercomputing Centre (LRZ)—provide scientists and engineers computing power and services of the highest performance class. Our long-running large-scale call (LSC) allocation program is the primary way for users to access large amounts of computing time on world-class high-performance computing (HPC) resources. This week, GCS opened the 36^th call for Large-Scale computing time Project. Scientists can now apply for computing time from July 13^th to August 10^th 2026, 17:00 o’clock CEST (strict deadline).

GCS Large-Scale Projects are characterized by projects that require a large amount of computing time, meaning a minimum of two percent of a system’s annual production in terms of estimated availability, over a period of 12 months. Researchers at German universities and publicly funded German research institutions are eligible to apply.

Interested researchers can apply to gain access to leading HPC systems:

• High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart (HLRS): Hunter
• Jülich Supercomputing Centre (JSC): JUPITER
• Leibniz Supercomputing Centre, Garching (LRZ): SuperMUC-NG

For further details on how to apply for computing time or to learn more about the technical details of the HPC systems, please visit the HPC Access page.

Hunter and SuperMUC-NG are jointly funded by the German Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space, with 50 percent contributed by the federal states of Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, and North Rhine-Westphalia respectively. JUPITER is being financed by the German Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space, the state of North-Rhine Westphalia, as well as the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking.

All large-scale projects go through a competitive review and resource allocation process established by the GCS. A “Call for Large-Scale Projects” is published by the Gauss Centre twice a year. Deadlines for calls are usually at the end of winter and at the end of summer of each year. An overview of the approved GCS Large-Scale Projects is available https://www.gauss-centre.eu/results/large-scale-projects.

Source: GSC

The post GCS Opens 36th Call for Large-Scale HPC Computing Projects appeared first on HPCwire.

The Promise Act would establish a legislative procedure with the goal of preserving Social Security's trust funds for the next 50 years.

Andrew Bailey warns that US will not be able to achieve its ambitions alone

The Bank of England governor has called for international cooperation to tackle growing AI threats, warning that the US and Trump administration would not be able to achieve their ambitions alone.

Andrew Bailey’s comments come weeks after the US president, Donald Trump, temporarily banned foreigners from using Anthropic’s powerful Claude Mythos model.

Chuck Schumer says Republicans are ‘ignoring the nation’s most urgent national security crisis’ amid US exchange of fire with Iran

• US politics live – latest updates

• Sign up for the Breaking News US newsletter email

Senate Democrats on Tuesday blocked the advancement of a must-pass defense bill in protest of Donald Trump’s resumption of hostilities with Iran.

The hold up of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) comes amid the fiercest exchange in fire between the countries in weeks, which has amplified frustration among Democrats that the US remains involved in the conflict despite the passage last month of a war powers resolution intended to force a ceasefire.

Lawsuit alleges administration coordinated with online surveillance groups to ‘criminalize solidarity with Palestine’

Mahmoud Khalil filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against Trump administration officials and several pro-Israel groups, accusing them of conspiring to target him and others as punishment for their support of Palestinian rights.

The former Columbia University graduate student became the face of the Trump administration’s crackdown on pro-Palestine speech after he was detained last year. A permanent US resident, Khalil is also fighting in court against the government’s effort to deport him.

Officials are still searching for the source of the outbreak, prompting consumers to seek advice on social media about which foods to avoid.

Capt. Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger, who famously landed a passenger jet on the Hudson River in 2009, said he has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease.

Building new data centers in New York will be paused for a year in order to allow state officials to establish guidelines protecting residents and the environment, Gov. Kathy Hochul said.

As European markets fell and oil prices hit a one-month high, President Donald Trump declared on Truth Social that the strait “is open to ALL Ship traffic except for Iran.”

An immigration officer shot and killed the 26-year-old Colombian man after reportedly ramming into his car

The man killed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in Maine on Monday has been identified as Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, an ICE spokesperson said in a statement.

An immigration agent shot and killed the 26-year-old Colombian man on Monday morning in Biddeford, Maine, after reportedly ramming into his car.

Here are hints and the answer for today's Wordle for July 15, No. 1,852.

Here are some hints and the answers for the NYT Connections puzzle for July 15, No. 1,130.

Bill marks a full-circle moment for the PM-in-waiting and encapsulates what he says his government will be about

Andy Burnham has always said he took his first steps out of Westminster in 2009, when he walked out to address furious Liverpool fans at the Kop on the 20th anniversary of the Hillsborough disaster.

They chanted “Justice for the 96” for a full two minutes before the then culture secretary was able to continue, demonstrating their anger that nobody in public office had been convicted of any offence over the tragedy.

Here are hints and answers for the NYT Strands puzzle for July 15 No. 864.

Google DeepMind chief Demis Hassabis is calling for a U.S.-led AI standards body to review frontier models for national security risks such as cybersecurity and biological threats. His proposal would create a federally overseen public-private organization, initially voluntary and eventually mandatory for U.S. deployment. CNBC reports: Google DeepMind boss Demis Hassabis, a Nobel laureate, said in an article posted on X on Tuesday that "urgent action" was needed to address risks associated with artificial general intelligence (AGI) -- the point at which AI matches or surpasses human intelligence. "We've already seen the challenges frontier models pose for cybersecurity, and other threats including nuclear and bio risks may soon emerge as capabilities continue to advance," he said. [...] Hassabis said the U.S. was well positioned to lead in developing an AI framework "given its economic and technical standing." "It could establish a new Standards Body modelled on a federally overseen public-private partnership or self-regulatory organisation, much like the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), with a board that includes independent leading technical experts and open-source representatives," he added. FINRA regulates brokerage firms and exchange markets in the U.S. The proposed body would need "substantial" funding "in order to attract world-class technical talent and provide the necessary compute resources for large-scale testing," Hassabis said. Funding would "likely" come from industry, he added. Frontier labs would initially voluntarily share models with the body for review up to 30 days before release, before becoming mandatory for deployment in the U.S. market after being shown to be "effective." "Specific agentic AI tests could look for attempts to bypass safety guardrails or signs of deception, and ensure best practices, such as digitally watermarking AI-generated images and generating human-readable output tokens to understand model reasoning," Hassabis said. Further reading: Over 200 Economists Say 'We Must Act Now' On AI's Economic Impact

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Senate Democrats blocked a must-pass annual defense policy bill from moving forward on Tuesday as they voiced opposition to the Trump administration's handling of the war with Iran.

The rumors keep coming for Google's latest flagships.

Supreme Court Justices Elena Kagan and Amy Coney Barrett urged Congress to provide additional funding to enhance protection for the justices as they face a rise in threats.

The text of the bill had been finalized before Graham met with Zelenskyy last week in Kyiv.

July 14, 2026 — The Fast Machine Learning (FastML) Foundation will hold the Fast Machine Learning for Science Conference 2026 through the University of California San Diego from Aug. 31 to Sept. 4. FastML will take place at the Halıcıoğlu School of Data Science and Computing San Diego Supercomputer Center.

Early bird registration, which ends July 15, is $500 for in-person attendance, $50 for remote attendance and $20 for hackathon-only attendance. After July 15, registration is $650 for in-person attendance, $65 for remote attendance and $26 for hackathon-only attendance.

The conference is an opportunity to examine the vast applications of machine learning (ML) in various fields of science and explore emerging ML methods.

Topics include Machine Learning Algorithm Design and Optimization, Accelerated Inference and Real-Time Processing, Scalable and Distributed ML Systems, Advanced Hardware and Computing Architectures, Scientific Applications of Fast ML and more.

At this conference, researchers and students will present posters, presentations, tutorials and topical sessions. There will be 90-minute poster and presentation sessions and 15-minute spotlight presentations selected by the committee. Tutorials will be presented Aug. 31 and topical sessions and hackathons are scheduled for Sept. 3 and Sept. 4.

The Fast Machine Learning for Science Conference is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Harnessing the Data Revolution (HDR) Institute AI-Accelerated Algorithms for Data-Driven Discovery (A3D3) and Exploring Neural Network Processors for AI in Science and Engineering (Voyager).

Source: Joanne Liu, SDSC

The post SDSC to Host Fast Machine Learning for Science Conference appeared first on HPCwire.

The House on Tuesday finally broke an impasse that had stalled most legislative action on the floor.

Progressive groups are demanding that Democrats on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence oppose Jay Clayton’s nomination as director of national intelligence, pointing to his role in an attempt to intimidate the New York Times over critical reporting on the Trump administration.

Some key Democrats, however, have so far not committed to opposing President Donald Trump’s nominee for the nation’s top intelligence job.

Clayton, who serves as the top federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York, signed the subpoenas sent Friday that targeted New York Times journalists for their reporting on serious security flaws in the Qatari-donated Air Force One jet.

Two Democrats on the intelligence committee did not indicate whether the subpoenas were a dealbreaker for Clayton’s nomination, which is set to be the subject of a Wednesday hearing.

Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., the vice chair of the committee, has not said whether he intends to vote in favor of Clayton’s nomination. He previously praised Clayton for having the “right temperament” when Trump tapped him, but has said he still wants to press the prosecutor about whether he will use the DNI post to pursue Trump’s 2020 election obsession.

Asked for comment about the subpoenas Tuesday, Warner said he anticipated that Clayton would be quizzed about the matter during his hearing.

“I think it’s important that we stand up for the independence of the press,” he said.

When asked by The Intercept whether the subpoenas were disqualifying for Clayton’s nomination, fellow intelligence committee member Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., said, “I’ve got questions about it.”

Related

Are Jeffries and Schumer Getting Ready to Greenlight Domestic Spy Power for Trump?

The cautious position staked out by the Democrats stood in sharp contrast to that of Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., the committee’s longest serving member and a frequent skeptic of the intelligence agencies when it comes to civil liberties. In a social media post Sunday, Wyden noted that federal agents hand-delivered some of the subpoenas to the reporters who co-authored the article.

“It seems Jay Clayton is up to his eyeballs in sending intimidation subpoenas to reporters and armed thugs to their homes,” Wyden said. “This is not acceptable in a DNI.”

Dems Pushing for Clayton

The subpoenas came at an awkward moment for some Democrats in Congress aligned with the intelligence community. Those Democrats, including Connecticut Rep. Jim Himes, the ranking member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, had hoped to swiftly confirm Clayton in order to cut short the temporary appointment of housing czar Bill Pulte as director of national intelligence.

Clayton was seen by Democrats such as Himes as an acceptable alternative to Pulte, who was handed the reins of the country’s intelligence apparatuses with a mandate from Trump to stoke baseless conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.

Some Democrats like Wyden, however, have noted that Clayton himself has also publicly indulged in election fraud conspiracy theories.

His role in the subpoenas should make him a non-starter for intelligence chief, a coalition of progressive groups including Indivisible and Reporters Without Borders said in a letter Monday.

“Members of Congress across the aisle have embraced Clayton as a more respectable option than Pulte and hope to see the nomination process quickly,” the groups said. “Measuring Clayton’s qualifications against Pulte’s rather than the demands of the office would be a detriment to national security.”

Caitlin Vogus, a senior adviser with Freedom of the Press Foundation, said intelligence committee members should grill Clayton over the subpoenas.

Related

This Is How Trump’s Department of Justice Spied on Journalists

“Anyone who hides behind fabricated ‘national security’ claims to demand journalists expose confidential sources can’t be trusted to lead America’s intelligence agencies,” Vogus said in a statement to The Intercept. “Senators should demand to know whether Clayton issued these outrageous subpoenas at the explicit behest of the White House, and whether he’d use similar tactics as DNI against journalists and whistleblowers who expose intelligence failures or abuses.”

The post Trump’s Intel Pick Played Key Role in NYT Subpoenas — But Some Democrats Still On the Fence appeared first on The Intercept.

Darline Graham, the sister of the late Sen. Lindsey Graham, was sworn in to serve out the remainder of his term in the Senate, following his sudden death over the weekend.

July 14, 2026 — The U.S. National Science Foundation announced it awarded the newest NSF Regional Innovation Engines (NSF Engines) awards to 12 U.S. teams across 20 states. These NSF Engines will build and scale innovation clusters that aim to accelerate the development of critical technologies, prepare talent for emerging jobs and grow regional economies. Building on decades of NSF investments in foundational research, the NSF Engines partner with the private sector to advance technology deployment and secure America’s position at the forefront of science and technology.

A map showing the locations of the U.S. National Science Foundation Regional Innovation Engines (NSF Engines) cohort 1 and 2.
Credit: U.S. National Science Foundation

View a map of these NSF Engines here.

“These new NSF Engines will be transformational for America’s innovation infrastructure — helping secure our national competitiveness in technologies and future industries that will be critical to our economic and national security for decades to come,” said Brian Stone, performing the duties of the NSF director. “These engines will unlock innovation and enable technologies that will improve the quality of life and result in good-paying jobs for all Americans.”

The newest NSF Engines awards span critical technologies and applications ranging from enhancing energy grid security to maximizing the yield of critical mineral mining extraction to advancing quantum computing. Each team, led by a coalition of regional organizations, including universities, nonprofits and private industry, will initially receive an award of $15 million over two years. Teams that demonstrate progress on well-defined milestones will have the potential to eventually receive up to $160 million each from NSF over the next decade as they seek to build an internationally competitive technology and innovation cluster in their region.

No single region can solve America’s technology challenges alone. NSF Engines are designed as a connected national network, linking complementary regional strengths. Together, they build domestic supply chains, fill capability gaps and accelerate technology advancement across key sectors and regions.

The NSF Engines program is beginning to demonstrate significant returns and impacts as a result of the nation’s investment via the inaugural NSF Engines funded two years ago. To date, an initial investment of $135 million in taxpayers’ dollars across nine inaugural NSF Engines has garnered more than $2 billion in matching commitments from private industry, philanthropy and state and local governments. These investments are also advancing technologies that maintain American competitiveness in critical areas, including advanced chipmaking, next-generation artificial intelligence, agriculture and food production, disaster preparedness and energy storage. This cohort of NSF Engines coincides with another round of funding released this summer for the inaugural NSF Engines that have demonstrated sustained progress over the first two years of performance.

The 12 newest NSF Engines are:

• NSF BRIDGES Engine in Alabama and Tennessee, led by the HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology.
• NSF Critical Materials Crossroads Engine in the Kansas City Region, led by the University of Missouri-Kansas City.
• NSF Critical Mineral Accelerator Engine in Alaska, led by the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
• NSF FAST Engine in Oregon, led by Oregon State University.
• NSF Grid Modernization Engine in the Carolinas, led by the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
• NSF IMPACT Engine in Indiana, led by Indiana University.
• NSF NEO-SMART Engine in Northeast Ohio, led by Case Western Reserve University with more than 70 regional partners.
• NSF Quantum Technologies Engine in Connecticut, led by the University of Connecticut.
• NSF RETI Engine in West Virginia and western Pennsylvania, led by West Virginia University in collaboration with the University of Pittsburgh, Carnegie Mellon University and the U.S. Research Impact Alliance.
• NSF RuralSTAMINA Biomanufacturing Engine in Iowa and Nebraska, led by Iowa State University.
• NSF Seafood Engine in New England, led by the Northeastern Regional Association of Coastal Ocean Observing Systems.
• NSF STELLAR Engine in the Rochester/Finger Lakes Region of New York, led by the University of Rochester.

To learn more about these NSF Engines, visit the NSF Engines Cohort 2 webpage.

Source: NSF

The post NSF Names 12 New Regional Innovation Engines to Advance Critical Tech appeared first on HPCwire.

SANTA CLARA, Calif., July 14, 2026 — Ultralytics, the company behind the YOLO family of object detection models, today announced collaboration with Intel to bring production-ready YOLO (You Only Look Once) computer vision models to Intel hardware, making real-time vision AI faster, easier, and more cost-effective to deploy across industries from robotics to manufacturing, logistics, and security.

Most real-world vision AI technologies run on existing, CPU-based infrastructures including industrial PCs, laptops and edge devices. By pairing Ultralytics YOLO models with OpenVINO Toolkit, developers can deploy YOLO models across various platforms powered by any Intel processor, putting the compute where appropriate: CPU, GPU, or NPU.

The result is faster, more cost-effective, and more accessible computer vision for the industries that need it most. The collaboration meets AI where it actually ships, resulting in faster inference in supported CPU/GPU scenarios, with sub-5-millisecond inference reported across YOLO tasks on Intel hardware, reducing latency and deployment costs.

“Enterprises train in the data center, but the real work of vision AI happens at the edge, on factory floors, in retail, in robotics-running on Intel CPUs and NPUs,” said Glenn Jocher, Founder and CEO of Ultralytics. “This collaboration means developers get state-of-the-art models like YOLO26 running production-ready on the hardware they already own, eliminating the need for a discrete GPU.”

The collaboration also cuts friction for developers, who can train and export their applications to OpenVINO and deploy them with the same familiar Ultralytics Platform or Python package and command line interface, often with a single command. This single workflow supports use cases in a variety of industries, including:

• Manufacturing: quality inspection, defect detection and process monitoring on factory-floor industrial PCs
• Logistics: parcel/asset detection, counting and tracking
• Security: monitoring analytics (people/object detection) plus privacy/compliance monitoring
• Retail: Shelf availability and inventory intelligence, including detecting SKUs, labels and shelf stock to monitor availability, planogram compliance and stock movement; real-time product recognition, including detecting, segmenting or tracking retail products for mobile applications, smart stores and e-commerce.
• Healthcare: internal imaging workflow improvement, annotation workflow, model validation and internal research-to-production workflows.
• Robotics: real-time perception on compact, power-efficient Intel hardware
• Smart cities: scalable vision on distributed edge infrastructure
• Edge AI broadly: bringing advanced vision to devices that use integrated AI acceleration already available on the SoC

“Extending Intel’s AI PC and physical AI platforms with leading open vision models helps developers deploy applications with real-world efficient AI inferencing on processors with AI acceleration built right in. This ensures that some of the industry’s top models are optimized for the latest Intel Core Ultra processors and beyond,” said Matthew Formica, Intel Senior Director & Global Head of Edge Technical Marketing. “We are excited to partner with Ultralytics to build on this momentum.”

About Ultralytics

Founded by Glenn Jocher, Ultralytics is the leading force in vision AI, best known for its Ultralytics YOLO (You Only Look Once) models. With over 135K GitHub stars, 300 million Pip downloads, and 3.3+ billion model usages, Ultralytics YOLOv5, YOLOv8, YOLO11, and now YOLO26 have become the most widely recognized object detection models globally. Ultralytics empowers users with easy-to-use, cutting-edge AI technology. Our mission is to simplify and democratize the use of AI, making it accessible and impactful across industries ranging from manufacturing to healthcare and more.

Source: Ultralytics

The post Ultralytics YOLO26 to Bring Real-Time Computer Vision to Intel Processors appeared first on HPCwire.

Baya’s WeaveIP fabric and WeaverPro software accelerating architecture development for Kandou’s 448G copper AI connectivity platform

SANTA CLARA, Calif. and SAINT-SULPICE, Switzerland, July 14, 2026 — Baya Systems, a leader in software-defined fabric IP for AI and high-performance computing, and Kandou AI, a pioneer in high-speed connectivity for AI infrastructure, today announced a strategic IP licensing agreement.

Kandou AI has licensed Baya’s WeaveIP fabric and WeaverPro software platform and is actively deploying both across its architecture and development workflow for the next generation of its connectivity platforms to overcome the memory wall constraining further AI development. The collaboration also demonstrates how software-defined fabric architecture and advanced connectivity work together to address the data movement bottleneck limiting next-generation AI systems.

Attacking the Memory Wall

AI model growth has outpaced memory bandwidth by orders of magnitude. While compute has scaled 60,000x over two decades, interconnect has managed just 30x. This clear mismatch is stymieing further AI development, since data simply can’t move at the speeds compute requires.

Kandou AI’s patented Copper MIMO technology (aka Chord Signaling) is closing that gap by sending correlated signals at real-time data processing speeds of 448 Gbps and beyond, providing the industry with strong alternatives to optical interconnects for a broad class of AI infrastructure applications. By using Copper Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) technology, Kandou can deliver 10X the efficiency of conventional alternatives at reduced power, costs and greater scalability. The economic impact is direct: faster, denser, cheaper AI systems.

While Kandou advances the physical layer of AI connectivity, Baya’s software defined fabric platform optimizes data movement for complex heterogeneous compute, memory, I/O on die and across multiple chiplets. Together, the technologies enable customers to architect AI systems that are not only faster, but also easier to design, validate, and scale.

“Solving the memory wall is a system-level challenge. Our breakthrough signaling technology is only one part of a broader AI system. We need a fabric architecture that can move data with the precision and efficiency our products demand,” said Srujan Linga, Co-Founder and CEO of Kandou AI. “Baya’s WeaveIP complements our interconnect technology. We provide physical scalability, with WeaveIP providing logical scalability to system design. Users are seeing in practice that WeaverPro significantly accelerates development timeline”.

Software-Driven Architecture, Faster to Silicon

Kandou AI selected WeaverPro to assist the exploration and validation of on-chip interconnect configurations, such as traffic class partitioning, QoS policy and protocol adaptation, before reaching the critical Register-Transfer Level phase of design and development. Because Baya’s tiled implementation methodology assembles verified fabric primitives into a configurable architecture, Kandou AI anticipates significant acceleration of development cycles and time to market.

“The tiled implementation approach is a genuine competitive advantage for teams working at our pace,” Linga continued. “Baya’s technical expertise and collaborative engagement has made them a true extension of our own engineering organization.”

A Partnership Built on Technical Alignment

The engagement reflects a broader convergence: both companies are building for an AI infrastructure landscape where data movement, which gates the scaling of compute, is the chief challenge to be solved. It accelerates the trend in the semiconductor industry towards modular AI architectures, where innovation depends on combining best in class connectivity, compute, memory and system fabrics.

“Kandou AI represents exactly the kind of customer Baya was designed to serve,” said Dr. Sailesh Kumar, Founder and CEO of Baya Systems. “They are attacking a real and fundamental problem, and they need a fabric platform that pushes beyond the data movement limitations of traditional NoC and enables them to realize their ambition. WeaveIP and WeaverPro offer the architectural freedom and implementation velocity to achieve that without compromise.”

The engagement further validates Baya’s growing role as the architectural foundation for next-generation AI infrastructure. As customers increasingly adopt chiplets, heterogeneous compute, and custom AI accelerators, software-defined fabrics are becoming a critical layer for optimizing data movement across the entire system.

About Kandou AI

Kandou AI is pioneering the next generation of connectivity for AI infrastructure. Its innovative Copper MIMO (aka Chord Signaling) technology — developed over more than a decade and rooted in information theory — enables high-speed, energy-efficient copper-based interconnects that extend performance beyond what conventional SerDes can achieve. Kandou AI is backed by leading technology investors including Maverick Silicon, BVP, Capital Group, SoftBank, Synopsys, Cadence and Alchip.

About Baya Systems

Baya Systems is a Series B semiconductor IP company pioneering software-defined, chiplet-ready fabric technology for AI, HPC, automotive and edge applications. Its WeaveIP fabric and WeaverPro software platform deliver a unified, protocol-agnostic interconnect solution purpose-built for the demands of next-generation AI systems. Headquartered in Santa Clara, California, Baya Systems is backed by leading technology investors and has been recognized by Frost & Sullivan for Technology Innovation Leadership in Semiconductor IP Interconnect Solutions.

Source: Baya Systems

The post Baya Systems and Kandou AI Partner to Tackle AI Memory Wall appeared first on HPCwire.

A boy, 16, and girl, 15, were charged with murder after the family members were shot at three different locations

Two teenagers were charged with murder Tuesday in the killings of five members of an Illinois family who were shot at three different locations.

A 16-year-old boy will be prosecuted as an adult, while the case against a 15-year-old girl will start in juvenile court before a possible transfer to the St Clair county criminal court, the county prosecutor’s office said.

Today, the Linux Foundation launched the x402 Foundation to standardize internet-native payments for AI agents, APIs, and applications, based on Coinbase's contributed x402 protocol. Backed by companies including AWS, American Express, Cloudflare, Google, Mastercard, Stripe, and Visa, the effort aims to make payments work directly over HTTP (assuming users are comfortable letting AI agents handle financial transactions). "The whole idea is to give agents access to money and, through that financial independence, improve their set of capabilities to pretty much anything on the internet," Lincoln Murr, Coinbase's AI product lead, told CNBC last month when the company announced the protocol. "In the 2010s, every internet company dealt with the transition from desktop and web into a mobile environment. And now in the late 2020s, we're seeing the exact same thing happen where agents are going to be the new primary economic actors on the internet."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

At London briefing, Caricom Reparations Commission decries fact region remains ‘most colonised part of world’

The main reparations committee for Caribbean nations has called on the UK to return the British Virgin Islands and for King Charles to commit to decolonising Britain’s remaining overseas territories, warning of a “resurgence of colonisation” around the world.

In a visit to the UK this week, the Caricom Reparations Commission – the body seeking reparative justice for enslavement, colonialism and its legacies on behalf of the alliance of Caribbean states – decried the fact that the Caribbean remained “the most colonised part of the world”.

Alistair Burt will bring diplomatic clout to complex cases involving human rights violations and arbitrary detention

The Foreign Office has appointed a special envoy for British citizens detained overseas, a new role to deal with “complex consular cases” such as that of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, the British-Iranian dual national who was imprisoned in Tehran for six years.

Alistair Burt, the former Conservative Middle East minister, has taken on the role, fulfilling a pledge by David Lammy when he was shadow foreign secretary.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says it is scouring food supply chain for culprit, which may be lettuce

• What is cyclosporiasis, the parasitic illness causing ‘explosive’ diarrhea?

Federal health officials have said they expect the outbreaks of cyclospora – a parasite that causes watery, explosive diarrhea – across the US to continue through August as they scour the food supply chain for the culprit.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has identified 1,645 lab-confirmed cases of the parasite; reported that 145 people have been hospitalized; and reported that they have a backlog of 5,100 cases that require more analysis, including interviews.

A far better Siri and performance benefits are reasons to upgrade and try out the beta, or wait till the fall.

A collision of online conspiracy theories came for two of the most powerful Republicans in the Senate in recent days

It was Russia. It was Israel. Could it have been Iran? Or maybe it was a Covid-19 booster. What about the Clintons?

After US senator Lindsey Graham died suddenly over the weekend from what a preliminary medical examiner report said was an aortic dissection, conspiracy theories spread quickly claiming – without evidence – that any number of foreign adversaries or other frequent conspiracy subjects might have orchestrated the Republican’s death.

Carl McDaniel, 65, from Washington state suffered broken bones after he was charged by a 2,000lb (900kg) bull during a visit to Yellowstone with his grandson on Friday. The encounter was recorded by Mike MacLeod, a professional photographer, who said the animal was 'agitated, pissed off and charging anything and everything'

• Yellowstone tourist tossed 8ft in air by bison says attack could have been worse

• Man tossed into the air by ‘agitated’ bull bison was grandfather visiting Yellowstone with grandson

SAN JOSE, Calif., July 14, 2026 — Cloudera today announced a strategic partnership with VAST Data to deliver a unified AI factory, a scalable production environment where data is continuously ingested, refined, governed, and delivered to AI models for training and inference.

Credit: Michael-Vi/Shutterstock

This infrastructure is available for enterprises operating across on-premises environments and public clouds, enabling a consistent AI operating model while allowing organizations to deploy AI services wherever performance, compliance and cost requirements are best met. The collaboration integrates Cloudera’s next-generation containerized data services with the VAST AI Operating System – which unifies high-performance storage, database, and global namespace capabilities to power large-scale AI, analytics, and mission-critical data workloads. This data-platform layer, based on the NVIDIA AI Data Platform reference design, turns latent enterprise data into AI-ready data that fuels the AI factory.

As organizations race to deploy generative and agentic AI, many are discovering that traditional architectures were not designed to support continuous AI pipelines spanning data preparation, training, inference, and analytics. One consequence is GPU starvation, where expensive accelerator clusters sit idle waiting for data. The joint solution addresses this challenge by ensuring data can move efficiently through the AI lifecycle while keeping GPUs continuously fed with high-throughput, low-latency data, dramatically improving utilization, performance, and return on investment.

Building the Enterprise AI Factory

Cloudera’s lakehouse architecture provides portable, containerized data services, including data engineering, streaming, analytics, machine learning, and AI, all deployable consistently across hybrid and multi-cloud environments. VAST’s Disaggregated Shared Everything architecture serves as the foundation of the VAST AI Operating System, delivering exabyte-scale data infrastructure, integrating vector database services with NVIDIA cuVS for GPU-accelerated vector indexing and search, and high-performance storage optimized for modern GPU clusters and AI workloads. Together, VAST’s AI OS leveraging the NVIDIA AI Data Platform reference design, with NVIDIA-accelerated computing, transforms latent enterprise data into activated AI-ready data, while Cloudera delivers data engineering, analytics, governance, and AI services on top.

Together, the companies deliver:

• A unified AI factory architecture from raw data ingestion to model deployment
• Consistent operations anywhere across data centers, private cloud, and public cloud
• Elimination of GPU starvation through ultra-high-bandwidth, low-latency data pipelines
• Significantly improved compute efficiency by ensuring GPUs operate at sustained utilization levels
• Superior storage performance at scale for structured, unstructured, and multimodal datasets
• Secure private AI environments with enterprise governance and compliance

This architecture enables organizations to move from isolated AI experiments to production-grade AI systems that continuously transform enterprise data into actionable intelligence for training, inference, analytics, and agentic applications.

This partnership also furthers solutions that create private AI factories by combining NVIDIA AI infrastructure, NVIDIA AI Enterprise software, the VAST AI OS as the foundational data platform and enterprise data and AI services from Cloudera into an optimized solution for private and sovereign AI. The Cloudera AI Inference Service, as one of the solutions, accelerated by NVIDIA NIM microservices, enables organizations to bring AI to their data where they can deploy and scale any model, including the latest NVIDIA Nemotron open models.

Customers will be able to accelerate Apache Spark workloads with NVIDIA cuDF to transparently accelerate Cloudera Data Engineering workloads by allowing Spark jobs to leverage VAST’s high-throughput data services via GPU-accelerated processing, supporting even more AI workload optimization.

For large enterprises, especially those in highly regulated industries, this represents a full “silicon-to-application” solution for building production-grade AI systems, anywhere.

Driving Significant Mutual Growth

The partnership combines 60 exabytes worth of customer-managed data, unlocking substantial new opportunities for both companies and their customers. This is coupled with an increasing enterprise demand for private AI infrastructure, creating a significant pipeline and future revenue growth opportunities.

“Enterprises are investing billions in GPUs, yet many struggle to achieve full utilization due to data bottlenecks,” said Abhas Ricky, Chief Business Officer & GM, Applied AI at Cloudera. “Our partnership with VAST eliminates GPU starvation and enables customers to build true AI factories—where data flows seamlessly from ingestion to insight.”

“Most enterprises already have the data they need for AI. The challenge is unlocking the value in data to create a continuous pipeline of AI inference, fine-tuning, and data analysis to build the next generation of intelligent applications,” said Jeff Denworth, Co-Founder at VAST Data. “Together, Cloudera and VAST are helping customers build AI factories that connect data, intelligence, and infrastructure into a single operational platform for AI across hybrid environments.”

The joint Cloudera–VAST AI factory solution is available immediately through both companies’ enterprise sales teams and partner ecosystems. Reference architectures, validated deployment patterns, and industry-specific solutions will continue to expand throughout 2026.

About Cloudera

Cloudera is the only hybrid data and AI platform company that large organizations trust to bring AI to their data anywhere it lives. Unlike other providers, Cloudera delivers a consistent cloud experience that converges public clouds, on-prem data centers, and the edge, leveraging a proven open-source foundation. As the pioneer in big data, Cloudera empowers businesses to apply AI and assert control over 100% of their data, in all forms, improving security, governance, and real-time and predictive insights. The world’s largest brands across all industries rely on Cloudera to transform decision-making and ultimately boost bottom lines, safeguard against threats, and save lives.

About VAST Data

VAST Data is the AI Operating System company – powering the next generation of intelligent systems with a unified software infrastructure stack that was purpose-built to unlock the full potential of AI. The VAST AI OS consolidates foundational data and compute services and agentic execution into one scalable platform, enabling organizations to deploy and facilitate communication between AI agents, reason over real-time data, and automate complex workflows at global scale. Built on VAST’s breakthrough DASE architecture – the world’s first true parallel distributed system architecture that eliminates tradeoffs between performance, scale, simplicity, and resilience – VAST has transformed its modern infrastructure into a global fabric for reasoning AI.

Source: Cloudera

The post Cloudera and VAST Data Launch Unified AI Factory for Hybrid Enterprise AI appeared first on HPCwire.

One social media user described the opening of its first outlet in Monterrey as ‘like the dog teaching a duck to fly’

A US chain’s plan to sell its version of Mexican food to Mexicans with a first branch south of the border has prompted bemusement, skepticism and anger among local people.

Chipotle Mexican Grill, known for its customisable burritos, tacos and bowls, has more than 4,000 locations worldwide and announced on Tuesday that it was expanding into Mexico in what it described as a significant milestone.

Group of major publishers accuses the tech giant of ‘one of the most prolific infringements of copyrighted materials in history’

A group of major publishers have filed a lawsuit against Google, accusing the company of illegally using millions of copyrighted books to help build its Gemini artificial intelligence models, in “one of the most prolific infringements of copyrighted materials in history”.

The case, filed in federal court in New York, has been brought by three publishers – Hachette Book Group, Cengage Learning, and Elsevier – and bestselling American author Scott Turow.

The mural in a Birmingham suburb is so popular that the shop’s owner is opening two hours early to meet demand

On a busy junction in Quinton, a suburb of Birmingham, England football stars Jude Bellingham and Morgan Rogers are peering out from the side of a fish and chip shop, tucking into the local delicacy: orange chips.

The huge lifelike image was pasted on the wall on Friday afternoon by a local guerilla artist seeking to foster West Midlands pride, both for the area’s footballing stars and for its distinctive neon battered chips.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche will appear Wednesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee for his confirmation hearing to take over the role on a permanent basis.

The stars appear to be aligning for SiPearl, the French chip startup that was founded in 2020 to develop an all-European chip for sovereign AI and HPC workloads. The company is now just months away from shipping its first ARM-based processor, the Rhea1, just as CPUs come back into favor for AI and HPC.

As the AI boom shifts the market’s attention from big, fast GPUs to back to good old CPUs, the folks at the SiPearl CPU startup must be thanking their good luck. Or maybe they knew something the rest of us didn’t.

“In SiPearl we always had a strong faith in CPUs, because CPUs are everywhere,” SiPearl Founder and CEO Philippe Notton said in an interview this week with EE News Europe. “Training and hype on AI, pushed for GPU’s everywhere, but when you have GPUs, you need to have CPUs to orchestrate the GPUs.”

As Notton pointed out, the previous recommendation of having one CPU for every eight GPUs has shifted, and the recommended setup for AI is now a one-to-one ratio. This change–which reflects the sequential nature of many AI inference tasks, as opposed to AI training tasks that can be effectively parallelized on GPUs–is what spurred Nvidia to not only acquire Groq’s IP for $20 billion but to push the development of its own ARM CPU, dubbed Vera.

Philippe Notton, CEO and founder of SiPearl

CPUs, indeed, are cool again.

Sovereign HPC Chips

Whether it was luck or unflinching faith in CPUs, there’s no mistaking the ultimate goal for SiPearl, which was to develop a competitive chip for AI and HPC, and to do so entirely in Europe, using European engineers, and using European money (well, mostly anyway). That was what spurred Notton and others to found the company back in 2020, and what has motivated them ever since.

As a fabless chip company, SiPearl relies on third-party fabs, namely TSMC. Building chip fabs is a whole different ballgame than designing them, and it is one where Europe is making some progress, via the €43 billion-EU Chips Act and initiatives like Open EU Foundries.

The idea for SiPearl originally came to Notton in 2015, when he led a team of 2,400 engineers at STMicroelectronics.  After joining Atos in 2017, Notton helped launch the European Processor Initiative (EPI) consortium, which seeks to bring HPC chip manufacturing back to Europe. He left Atos to found SiPearl in 2020.

SiPearl pledged to only raising money from European firms. Last July, it closed a €130 million Series A round that saw investments from public funds like European Investment Council Fund, France 2030, and the European Investment Bank. It has also seen investments from corporate investors like the British semiconductor firm Arm Holdings and Bull, which recently separated from Atos and aims to revive high-end server manufacturing in Europe. The company has also taken money from Cathay Venture Capital, a Taiwanese firm, with the blessing of the European Union.

SiPearl is now closing in on the end of its first chapter, which is getting its first chip in production. The company in May announced that it has received Rhea1 from the lab and has started its “bring-up” process, marking the final countdown to general availability, which is expected to occur in late 2026 or early 2027.

Inside the Rhea1

The Rhea1 CPU is a monolithic ARM chip designed for HPC and AI workloads. Each Rhea1 chip contains 80 Arm Neoverse V1 cores manufactured by TSMC using a 6 nm process, and each Neoverse V1 core contains two Scalable Vector Extension (SVE) of 256 bits each across FP64, FP32, BF16, and INT8 formats. It’s supported by a wide range of compilers, libraries and tools, from traditional programming languages such as C/C++, GO and RUST to modern AI frameworks such as TensorFlow and PyTorch.

Rhea1 chip diagram (Source: SiPearl)

Memory-wise, the Rhea1 delivers a unique mixed-memory architecture composed of standard DDR5 as well as High Bandwidth Memory (HBM), which has been most commonly used in GPUs. Rhea1 will have 2TB per socket across four DDR5 interfaces, each supporting 2 DIMMs Per Channel (2DPC). Each chip will also house four HBM stacks, providing a total of 64GB of HBM2e, with an estimated 1.8 TB/s of total HBM memory bandwidth, which should be a boon for HPC and AI workloads.

The first design of Rhea1 did not including HBM. However, the chip was redesigned to include HBM from Samsung, which delayed the shipment date, as Agam Shah reported in HPCwire back in June 2024. On the network front, Rhea1 will move data via 104 lanes of PCIe Gen5 and connects compute and I/O elements across the Arm Neoverse CMN-700 Coherent Mesh Network on Chip (NoC) interconnect.

“With Rhea1, we are fulfilling the mission entrusted by the European Union to the European Processor Initiative consortium, and subsequently to SiPearl: to bring high-end processor technologies and the associated expertise back to Europe,” Notton stated.

CPUs for Euro Gigafactories

As HPC gurus have pointed out, data movement and energy–not processing power–is the main bottleneck today, which doesn’t play in favor of GPUs. If a processor is overly burdened with the need to move data–say, back and forth from a GPU to a CPU–then it doesn’t matter how many exaflops of compute capacity you have; you’re still going to be limited by memory bandwidth.

The Chinese appear to have learned this lesson with their own sovereign supercomputer, dubbed LineShine, which recently took the top spot in the TOP500 list. LineShine is powered entirely by all-Chinese sourced gear, including LingKun LX2 chips based on the ARM9 instruction set. The chips, which use a chiplet architecture, contain vector and matrix engines, thereby eliminating the need for separate AI accelerators. It also a mixed-memory system that uses both DDR and HBM, like Rhea1.

EuroHPC’s Jupiter cluster installed at Jülich Supercomputing Centre in Germany

Rhea1 is also slated to be installed in EuroHPC’s first exascale system, the Jupiter cluster module, at the Jülich Supercomputing Centre. The cluster module will have more than 1,300 nodes powered by Rhea1. The Jupiter Booster module, which is already online, has about 6,000 compute nodes composed of about 24,000 Nvidia GH200 superchips connected to an InfiniBand network.

SiPearl is already moving forward with new chip designs, including. Rhea2 will shift to a chiplet-based design, as opposed to the large monolithic die used in Rhea1. SiPearl is planning to complete tape out of Rhea2 in 2027. The chip is slated to be part of the Alice Recoque cluster, which will be installed at the CEA’s TGCC supercomputing center at Bruyères-le-Châtel.

Meanwhile, SiPearl is moving forward with a version of Rhea1 for Europe’s defense, aerospace, government, and private data center applications. Athena1 will give customers the choice of 16, 32, 48, 64 or 80 Arm Neoverse V1 cores. Also manufactured by TSMC, Athena1 is slated for delivery in the second half of 2027. Packaging of Athean1 will initially be carried out in Taiwan, but SiPearl plans to move it to Europe to help build the continent’s industrial base.

Ultimately, building out the European supply chain for high-perofrmance computing is the goal.  Last week, SiPearl announced it’s participation in AETHER Infrastructures, an initiative to build a European gigafactory, as part of the European Commission’s $20 bil. Planning is already underway to build two data centers in the Strasbourg region of France, FR-SXB1 and FR-SXB2, which collectively will feature 42 megawatts of capacity. The plan calls for the AETHER Consortium to build more than 400MW of data center capacity in a net-zero manner, featuring systems and components from SiPearl; 2CRSi, a European manufacturer of high-performance servers featuring Nvidia and AMD processors; and Axelera AI, a European developer of AI accelerators.

“By combining SiPearl’s high-performance processors with Axelera AI’s accelerators in 2CRSi’s high-density servers, we will deliver a complete hardware solution capable of handling the most demanding AI workloads–with the added benefit of European sovereignty,” Nottn stated.

As the AI boom continues to expand, SiPearl and others are hoping to ride the wave along with a renewed drive by Europeans to build European-centric high performance computing. So far, it seems to be working.

The post Can SiPearl Revive the European HPC and AI Chip Industry? appeared first on HPCwire.

Outgoing prime minister opens third reading debate on the Hillsborough law bill

In response to a question from Alec Shelbrooke (Con), Campbell said he was “totally unaware” not just of the wording of the Tory opposition day motion planned for tomorrow (see 1.04pm), but of the topic that it was going to cover. In a bid to convince MPs that this was not a lie, he said that he was standing at the despatch box and that MPs knew the importance of a minister “telling the absolute truth when they stand here”.

In the Commons, Alan Campbell, the leader of the house, has just announced there will be a change in parliamentary business tomorrow. Wednesday was set aside for an opposition day debate – a debate on a motion tabled by the Tories. Instead, there will be a general debate on the situation in Iran. There will also be a vote on the regulations banning support for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

The government has a majority of more than 150 and it could not trust its MPs to vote the right way on that motion [delaying the recess], and it could not bear the idea of a new prime minister facing any scrutiny before September.

A prime minister, let me remind us all, who has been chosen by a coronation not a contest, with no known platform, almost no known policies, and no idea of his priorities or indeed his cabinet team.

The Paramount+ documentary "The Real Wolf of Wall Street" gives an inside look at Jordan Belfort's scandal-ridden firm, Stratton Oakmont.

OnePlus will reportedly announce this week that it is shutting down its brand in the U.S. and Europe, following months of signs that parent company Oppo was winding down the brand's global presence. India and China are reportedly unaffected, but it's unclear whether Oppo will replace the brand directly in those markets. The move also raises questions about future support for existing OnePlus users. 9to5Google reports: WinFuture reports that OnePlus is gearing up for an official withdrawal from the U.S. and European markets, with the announcement due in the "coming days" this week. Closed-door press conferences have apparently happened, with no details shared on the exact reason OnePlus as a brand is shutting down in these markets. India and China are, as far as this report claims, not affected. The report, citing "well-informed sources," notes that this OnePlus announcement will come amid "fundamental changes" to Oppo's strategy, but the big point here is the global death of OnePlus.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

For now, a single satellite has been cleared for a test demonstration, but the company making it hopes to eventually launch 50,000 of them into orbit.

LEUVEN, Belgium and SYDNEY, July 14, 2026 — Imec, a world-leading research and innovation hub for advanced semiconductor technologies, and Diraq, a pioneer of silicon-based quantum computing, have announced they have demonstrated the coherent operation and readout of an eight silicon MOS spin-qubit array designed and fabricated on imec’s advanced 300mm spin-qubit technology platform using a CMOS-compatible process. The results, published in a Nature Communications paper, mark an important step toward scalable quantum processors manufactured with the same industrial technologies used to produce today’s most advanced semiconductor chips.

Silicon spin qubits are widely regarded as one of the most promising pathways to large-scale quantum computing because they can exploit the infrastructure, supply chains and manufacturing expertise already developed by the semiconductor industry. The work of this paper builds on imec and Diraq’s earlier demonstration, in a 2025 Nature paper, showing that industrially manufactured silicon spin qubits can achieve fidelity levels required for quantum error correction.

While that result established the viability of individual and two-qubit building blocks, the work extends this and demonstrates that imec’s process can be scaled to larger arrays: an eight-qubit linear array was demonstrated, maintaining the coherence and controllability required for future large-scale quantum computers. In addition, scaling the readout architecture for this larger array does not require a significant increase in sensor count, wiring density, or thermal load; this type of favorable scaling ratio points toward arrays that remain highly compact as they grow, which is required for large scale quantum processors.

The eight-qubit devices were fabricated on imec’s 300mm silicon spin-qubit platform, which leverages CMOS-compatible manufacturing technology developed over nearly a decade of process optimization and engineering, bridging the gap between laboratory demonstrations and manufacturable quantum technologies.

“The future of quantum computing depends not only on qubit quality but also on the ability to manufacture increasingly complex quantum processors with the reproducibility, yield and scale of the semiconductor industry,” said Kristiaan De Greve, fellow and program director quantum computing at imec. “This result demonstrates that industrial 300mm CMOS-compatible manufacturing can support quantum systems beyond isolated qubit pairs. By combining imec’s advanced semiconductor process technology with quantum device engineering, we are taking important steps toward realizing scalable silicon-based quantum processors.”

“This is what an industrial pathway to quantum computing looks like,” said Andrew Dzurak, Founder and CEO of Diraq. “Nine months ago, we showed the world that silicon MOS qubits could be fabricated reliably using imec’s 300 mm CMOS platform technology. Today, imec has scaled and Diraq has tested the size of the array using exactly the same process, with no compromise in coherence. This is the cadence we need to reach utility scale, and it is the type of cadence we expect to keep.”

About imec

Imec is a world-leading research and innovation hub in advanced semiconductor technologies. Leveraging its state-of-the-art R&D infrastructure and the expertise of over 6,500 employees, imec drives innovation in semiconductor and system scaling, artificial intelligence, silicon photonics, connectivity, and sensing.

Imec’s advanced research powers breakthroughs across a wide range of industries, including computing, health, automotive, industry, consumer electronics, aerospace and security. Through IC-Link, imec delivers customized solutions, from concept to full-scale manufacturing, to meet the most advanced design and production needs. Through imec.ventures, imec creates, co‑creates new ventures, and supports existing semiconductor deep‑tech companies to scale-up.

Imec collaborates with global leaders across the semiconductor value chain, as well as with technology companies, start-ups, academia, and research institutions in Flanders and worldwide. Headquartered in Leuven, Belgium, imec has research facilities in Belgium, across Europe, the USA and the GCC region, and representation on three continents. In 2025, imec reported revenues of €1.2 billion.

About Diraq

Diraq is commercializing quantum computing with a silicon-based approach that uses existing CMOS processes. By utilizing the same manufacturing methods that produce today’s semiconductor components, Diraq is pioneering a faster, more economic road to commercial-scale quantum computing. The company’s proprietary ‘quantum dot’ technology is based on 20 years of research by founder Andrew Dzurak, designed to enable millions of qubits on a single chip, for powerful and scalable deployments. Diraq’s mission is to revolutionize quantum computing by unlocking the scale needed for useful commercial applications. Diraq was founded in Sydney, Australia, where its R&D facilities are based. The company’s U.S. headquarters are in Palo Alto, California, with additional offices in Los Angeles and Chicago.

Source: imec

The post Imec and Diraq Scale CMOS-Manufactured Silicon Spin Qubits to Eight-Qubit Array appeared first on HPCwire.

BROOMFIELD, Colo. and CAMBRIDGE, England, July 14, 2026 — Quantinuum Inc., Rolls-Royce, Riverlane and EPCC, the UK National Supercomputing Centre based at the University of Edinburgh, today announced an agreement to explore the quantum computing capabilities needed in future industrial workflows, such as gas turbine design.

Under the agreement, Quantinuum will provide access to its quantum systems and software environment; Rolls-Royce will contribute industrial design use cases and domain expertise; Riverlane will contribute quantum error correction and algorithmic expertise; and EPCC will contribute supercomputing expertise and hybrid workflow integration.

Complex fluid dynamics simulations are central to gas turbine design, but they can require substantial computing resources as models become more detailed. In what is expected to be a multi-year collaboration, the partners will explore how fault-tolerant quantum computers could work alongside supercomputers to address this bottleneck, and accurately model fluid dynamics inside gas turbines.

“The computing demands of simulating complex fluid dynamics are a major challenge in industrial design, and exploring how quantum computing can complement today’s supercomputers is an important step toward addressing them,” said Dr. Rajeeb Hazra, President and CEO of Quantinuum. “This collaboration will help develop and test the hybrid quantum-classical algorithms needed for future industrial applications.”

The collaborators plan to test key computational building blocks for industrially relevant quantum algorithms on Quantinuum’s Helios quantum computer and assess how these could scale on planned future systems, such as Sol and Apollo.

This project builds on prior collaborations between Rolls-Royce, Riverlane and EPCC that laid the foundations for understanding key algorithmic, error correction and data requirements for tackling fluid dynamic simulations with commercial quantum computers.

“We have been developing and improving algorithms for hybrid fault-tolerant applications for almost five years with Riverlane, using classical emulators in collaboration with EPCC. This agreement marks the start of an exciting new phase where we work together to explore their implementations on Quantinuum’s hardware,” said Leigh Lapworth, Fellow in Computational Science at Rolls-Royce. “Applications development is a multi-year activity and if we want to be in a position to benefit from teraQuOp devices, we have to start now, co-developing the algorithms, hardware and software.”

“Riverlane specialises in quantum error correction (QEC), as the critical technology that will ultimately unlock large fault-tolerant quantum computing, and fault-tolerant applications for various industries,” said Steve Brierley, CEO and Founder of Riverlane. “Building on our work with Rolls-Royce and EPCC, collaborating with Quantinuum will help us explore how fault-tolerant quantum computing and hybrid quantum-HPC approaches can accelerate the path to industrial quantum computing.”

EPCC will contribute its expertise in high-performance computing, simulations and the software interfaces needed to connect quantum and classical systems. Its role includes exploring how different parts of an algorithm can be compiled, emulated and executed across classical and quantum resources, including pre- and post-processing steps required for hybrid compute workflows.

“Quantum computing will be most valuable when users can exploit it within a wider computing environment, and EPCC has been working towards hybrid HPC and quantum since my appointment as a Chancellor’s Fellow in 2023,” said Oliver Thomson Brown, Quantum Group lead at EPCC. “EPCC’s mission is to accelerate the effective use of novel computing across industry and academia, and this project is a natural fit with the goals of the UK’s first National Supercomputing Centre.”

The UK’s quantum computing mission aims to develop accessible, UK-based quantum computers capable of one trillion error-free operations, known as “teraQuOp” systems. The collaboration and its anticipated multi-year timeline support the UK Government’s quantum computing mission and reflect the strength and maturity of the UK’s quantum and advanced computing ecosystem in moving from foundational research toward industrially relevant hybrid applications.

About Quantinuum

Quantinuum is a leading quantum computing company offering a full-stack platform designed to make quantum computing deployable in real-world environments. The company has commercially deployed multiple generations of trapped-ion based quantum systems built on the well-established QCCD architecture, which it has implemented with novel designs and capabilities to achieve the industry’s highest accuracy levels based on average two-qubit gate fidelity.[2] Quantinuum has active engagements with market leaders across pharmaceuticals, material science, financial services, and government and industrial markets, as well as academic and research institutions globally.

Source: Quantinuum

The post Quantinuum, Rolls-Royce Lead UK Effort to Advance Hybrid Quantum-HPC Design Workflow appeared first on HPCwire.

At SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Q-NEXT collaborator Shannon Harvey develops quantum dots — a mass-producible type of qubit. Driven by curiosity about nature and how things work, Harvey draws on her facility for working at the nanoscale.

July 14, 2026 — Studying an object with zero dimensions takes serious creativity. Consider the singularity — a point packed with infinite energy that sparked the Big Bang. Or the humble mathematical point, an abstract but indispensable fixture in space-time. Grasping a thing that has no size or shape demands imagination and rigor.

Or take qubits. Manipulating these zero-dimensional, information-carrying ripples in quantum space requires mental and manual dexterity. Yet those who work on qubits seldom tout the rich set of skills they bring to bear on their research.

Q-NEXT collaborator Shannon Harvey of SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory works on the fabrication of quantum dots, a mass-producible type of qubit. Image credit: Jacqueline Ramseyer Orrell/SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory.

The scientific endeavor’s many creative dimensions are what drew Shannon Harvey to the work of finessing these dimensionless bits of information.

“What I love about working in quantum information is that we can use today’s technologies to play with nature’s quantum features, something that until recently would have seemed incredible,” said Harvey, a scientist at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. ​“I really thrive on the multifaceted nature of this research, solving and coming up with problems by embedding myself in the experimental details and trying to understand how they all fit together. For me, scientific exploration involves reading and writing papers, solving math problems, even soldering and welding. Often within the same day.”

Harvey brings her multifaceted set of skills to Q-NEXT, a DOE National Quantum Information Science Research Center led by DOE’s Argonne National Laboratory in partnership with SLAC. A national research hub, Q-NEXT aims to coax nature’s quantum features into sharing information over distances large and small. It’s a collaborative effort that’s helped by a knack for futzing with particles.

The particle of Harvey’s attention is a type of qubit called a quantum dot.

Picture an electron, a tiny ripple bopping around inside a tiny space. Now imagine fencing it in so tightly that it’s trapped in an even smaller space, smaller than its own wavelength — like putting up walls that hug someone so closely, they have no room to lift their arms. Hemmed in, the electron is compelled by the rules of physics to take on a set of specific energy values. Its wave transforms into a set of distinct wavelengths, like a chord separating into a series of pure tones. Those discrete energies let scientists fine-tune and control how the electron stores and shares information.

That’s a quantum dot: a particle that’s confined to a space smaller than its wavelength, transformed into an object with multiple energy values. (One might say that the particle is squeezed for information.)

The qubit is the basis of quantum technologies, which are expected to speed up drug discovery, make financial transactions more secure, provide eavesdrop-proof telecommunication and more. As a qubit species, the quantum dot has a lot going for it. For one, it’s tunable, like a radio, so it can share information over different frequencies depending on how it’s used. And, most relevant for Harvey’s research, quantum dots can be mass-produced.

“The real selling point of quantum dot qubits is that they’re scalable,” Harvey said. ​“You can put a ton of them on a chip and then build a quantum computer on that chip.”

That’s the dream: a chip that contains multitudes. Harvey and her colleagues are designing quantum dots so they can crowd millions — or even billions — onto a something the size of a drink coaster. That scalability is both a feature and a bug, Harvey said.

Scalability means quantum dots can be made affordably; perform consistently and reliably; and can compatibly work with larger systems and existing technologies.

The challenge — the bug — is that a chip chock-a-block with dots is noisy. The noise muddles the qubit’s signal.

“You want to be able to control the qubit’s energy. If there’s some noise that’s causing the energy to fluctuate in time, you’ll lose the knowledge of what your qubit is doing, lose control. And then the qubit stops being useful,” Harvey said.

The lower the noise, the more reliable and pliable the qubit.

But taming noise is only half of it. Harvey’s job is about more than shushing, like an usher at the symphony. She works to create a quiet environment in which a massive quantum dot brigade can perform harmoniously, sending and receiving data with no interference, no snags. What properties will smooth the information pathway? What’s the best way to connect quantum dots to surrounding structures, which are themselves noisy? At which temperature does the quantum dot perform best? How should quantum dots be spaced to prevent interference? What software capabilities are needed to keep everything under control?

The work is a mix of materials science, computer science, engineering and basic physics, not to mention patience, exploration and ingenuity. Harvey reaches across the disciplinary aisle at SLAC to connect with cosmologists building detectors for studying the outer universe. It’s a perk of working at the SLAC Millikelvin Facility, where researchers explore nature at both extremes of scale.

“It’s a really open environment. We lack walls literally. I’ve learned a lot from the other people in the building who have very different expertise than I have. I never knew how similar the things I think about are to the people who are doing experiments for cosmology,” she said. ​“It’s very different from what you see in academia. And even though it’s not this huge-scale facility, it’s really an example of what national labs can bring to the table. It’s a special experience.”

As a child, Harvey had ​“zero interest in science,” she said. ​“I just wanted to read novels all the time.” She enjoyed math, ​“but math was not quite enough connected to the real world. I have this wide-ranging curiosity where I want the answer to everything, and one of my main challenges is to focus down onto one thing instead of trying to work on everything.”

As an undergraduate at Cornell University, she saw that physics gave her a way both to connect with and answer many of the questions she had about the real world.

“I completely fell in love with experimental physics,” she said.

She earned her doctorate from Harvard and completed a postdoctoral fellowship under David Schuster, also a Q-NEXT collaborator, at Stanford University. A significant part of Q-NEXT research at SLAC takes place in partnership with Stanford University.

Her stint as a postdoc illuminated the lightning-fast progress that quantum information science had made in only a few years.

“I was amazed. All these pieces of equipment that I had spent painstaking hours in my Ph.D. building myself — now I could click and buy them. I thought, ​‘Wow. If I’d had this back then, I could have done my Ph.D. in two months,’” Harvey said. ​“That’s not exactly true, but it’s really exhilarating to be part of a community that’s moving quickly, propelling things forward. There’s so much intellectual vibrancy in quantum.”

The pace of advancements in quantum technology is not expected to let up.

“What’s great about quantum is that it’s where the action is right now,” she said. ​“Quantum computers have these far-off applications. But I think that, in a lot of ways, all these technologies that we are building are going to be the future of atomic physics and condensed matter physics no matter what. You can already see them having a big impact.”

For Harvey, the draw of quantum isn’t just its promise, but the joy of the pursuit.

“I made a lot of mistakes as a 21-year-old, but when I decided to do research in quantum — I really nailed that one,” she said. ​“I knew I would keep enjoying this for a very long time.”

This work was supported by the DOE Office of Science National Quantum Information Science Research Centers as part of the Q-NEXT center.

Source: Leah Hesla, Argonne National Laboratory

The post SLAC’s Shannon Harvey Advances Scalable Quantum Dot Qubits appeared first on HPCwire.

Chesley Sullenberger, 75, safely landed a US Airways flight carrying 155 people in New York’s Hudson River in 2009

Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger – the pilot known for the “Miracle on the Hudson” after safely landing a US Airways flight in New York City’s Hudson river during a 2009 emergency – announced on Tuesday that he was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.

“For now, this means a name may not come easily to me, I forget a story I have recently told, or I don’t sleep as well, but I am in the beginning of this long journey,” Sullenberger, 75, said in a statement. “This new phase of my life has challenged what it means to be of service. And the answer is to speak up. It is my hope that by sharing this, other families living in the shadows with this disease will feel they too can step forward.”

Kent Carpenter and his Filipina companion were at his house in the coastal town of Sibulan when masked men forced their way in.

Pop star, whose parents are Kosovan Albanian, expresses admiration for demonstrations, which are entering their sixth week

Albania’s “flamingo revolution” has won its most prominent supporter yet after the pop star Dua Lipa expressed admiration for the protest movement against a Trump family-backed resort in the Balkan state.

As demonstrations against the €1.6bn (£1.36bn) real estate project entered a sixth week, the London-born singer, who was partially raised in Pristina, home to her Kosovan Albanian émigré parents, described the civic unrest as “inspiring”.

Donald Trump’s tariff threat recasts Brazil’s attempt to protect its democracy as unfair commercial practice – and gives Bolsonarism a Washington stage

Last June, Brazil’s supreme court responded to the online lies that helped fuel Jair Bolsonaro’s failed far-right coup attempt in 2023. It ruled that social media platforms could be held liable for some users’ posts, forcing firms such as Elon Musk’s X and Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta to remove hate speech and anti-democratic content. A month later, Donald Trump proposed a 25% tariff on Brazilian imports, complaining that the judges had made US tech firms take down “political” material.

At a hearing held at the US International Trade Commission last week, an extraordinary platform was given to Mr Bolsonaro’s son, Flávio. He is the opposition candidate running to be president in this year’s election while his father serves a 27-year prison sentence. His message to Washington was that the US’s problem with his country’s unfair trade practices was down to the president, Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva, who has clashed with Mr Trump.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

British Columbia pilot was only person aboard helicopter that crashed during aerial firefighting

The pilot who died when his helicopter crashed while fighting a Colorado wildfire has been named as Nicholas Dale of Sooke, British Columbia.

Dale, 56, died when his helicopter crashed into the Silver Jack reservoir on Monday while fighting what authorities have named the Gold Mountain fire, the local Gunnison county sheriff’s office said. His body was later recovered from the submerged helicopter by divers.

A jury concluded in 2023 that Trump should pay Carroll $5 million in damages.

New estimates call for a 3.6% to 3.8% benefit increase next year, although the final adjustment will depend on inflation readings released this summer.

Every aspect of artificial intelligence, from its economic impact to its societal and cultural consequences, is under a microscope. One topic of growing concern for consumers, local governments and environmental advocates is its energy demand.

President Donald Trump, who has encouraged aggressive AI development in the U.S., offered an estimate of how much electricity AI will require.

"They need, just as an industry, more energy than the entire country produces right now, when you think about it, which is incredible," Trump said July 8 at the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey. "So, take all of the energy that the United States produces, and that one industry — which is so big, so powerful — it needs more than that. In fact, some people say almost double."

AI’s energy requirements have snowballed in recent years, and industry experts believe demand will likely grow. 

However, the AI energy load is nowhere near as big as Trump said.

"I don't see a pathway for data center demand to exceed total electricity demand in the U.S., or even approach anything close to that level," said Brendan Pierpont, the director for electricity at Energy Innovation Policy and Technology LLC, an energy and climate policy think tank.

The White House did not respond to an inquiry for this article.

What the estimates show

AI requires "training" large language models, which involves running a large number of computers continuously for months. As a result, the data centers that process AI use a large amount of electricity.

It’s difficult to project future AI energy loads with certainty — estimates vary for how much electricity AI will require, how much electricity can be generated, and how economically it can be produced.

With this caveat in mind, we reviewed several studies from federal sources and energy-focused think tanks. None comes close to Trump’s estimate.

• A December 2025 report by the Energy Department’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory concluded that by 2028, the total power demand for data centers — the facilities that power AI — would account for 6.7% to 12% of that year’s total U.S. electricity consumption.

• A report by the Electric Power Research Institute, a think tank, projects U.S. data centers could consume 9% to 17% of national electricity by 2030, up from up from 4% to 5% today.

• Looking at a longer timeframe, an April report by the federal Energy Information Administration concluded that by 2050, electricity demand for data centers would account for a maximum of 15% of total electricity demand.

• A report by the World Resources Institute, an energy and environment think tank, collected an additional half dozen additional governmental and private-sector projections for U.S. data center energy use. The highest one — a November 2025 report by the Boston Consulting Group — finds that data center needs would represent about a quarter of the 2023 level of all U.S. electricity generation.

These estimates of expected AI energy loads range from 6% to 25%. Some of these studies say AI’s energy use footprint in the U.S. could double from what it is now — but that’s not what Trump said. 

"Trump’s estimate is very high relative to credible projections," said Kenneth Gillingham, a Yale University economist who specializes in energy and environmental issues.

Our ruling

Trump said the AI industry needs "more energy than the entire country produces right now ... In fact some people say almost double."

Multiple federal and independent studies project that from 2028 to 2050, the energy needs of data centers will account for 6% to 25% of total U.S. electricity demand.

These are significant increases, but they are not 100% or 200% increases of overall U.S. energy production.

The statement contains an element of truth but ignores facts that would give a different impression, so we rate it Mostly False.

Lower gasoline prices slowed inflation in June, though many household costs remained stubbornly high.

Internal orders handed down by leaders at U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement instructed officers in the field to stop making vehicle stops, according to five ICE officials around the country.

The directive, handed down in at least three of ICE’s administrative regions Monday and effective immediately, came after a pair of killings in Texas and Maine by ICE agents that involved attempts to stop cars.

The ICE officers who spoke with The Intercept, who asked for anonymity to discuss internal orders, said the shift was meant to mitigate the chances of shootings like the ones that sparked outrage by taking the lives of two immigrants over the past week.

“We have been told to either grab them before they leave their parking spot, or follow them and arrest them where they stop (ie a gas station or place of work) to avoid these situations,” said an ICE official from the South.

“This shit isn’t normal,” the official said. “Whatever these chucklefucks did in Maine and Houston is serious.”

ICE did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The five officials who spoke to The Intercept about the directive all hail from ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations division, which carries out most of the federal government’s street immigration arrests. (ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations, the agency’s criminal investigative arm, did not receive a directive about vehicle stops, according to two special agents.)

The directive to ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations, which was first reported by the New York Times, didn’t come down as written orders, two of the ICE officials told The Intercept.

Instead, said one of the ICE officials who works in the Mountain West region, the order came down through field office directors to avoid red tape associated with putting an official policy in place.

Related

Chicago Woman Shot by Border Patrol Reacts to Minneapolis ICE Killing: “Of Course This Happened”

Along with street arrests, vehicle stops had become go-to tactic for ICE in the second Trump administration, with ramped-up enforcement that has included crackdowns on large cities like Minneapolis. Under past administrations, including President Donald Trump’s first term, ICE relied mostly on transfers from local jails and prisons to satisfy its enforcement priorities.

The vehicle stops also contributed to a recent explosion of immigrant detentions, with ICE announcing roughly 10,000 arrests over a five-day period in late June 2026.

Ending the vehicle stops, said the ICE official based in the South, “definitely hinders enforcement.”

Killings in Vehicle Stops

In a recent period of less than a week, Mexican national Lorenzo Salgado Araujo was shot and killed by ICE officers in Houston and Colombian national Joan Sebastian Guerrero was shot and killed in Biddeford, Maine.

Details surrounding the shootings are still emerging, but Department of Homeland Security officials have said that neither Araujo nor Guerrero were the intended targets of the ICE enforcement operations that claimed their lives. The officers involved in the shootings were not wearing body cameras in either case.

The killings sparked public outrage and probes at both the state and local levels.

Related

ICE Drives Unmarked Cars. This Public Database Tracks Their License Plates.

In addition to investigations by FBI and the Homeland Security Department’s Office of the Inspector General, Maine’s attorney general and the attorney general in Harris County, Texas, which includes Houston, launched investigations. Local police departments in both Maine and Texas are assisting with the investigations.

There are few precedents for ICE to cut off its enforcement division agencywide from using vehicle stops to make apprehensions.

As federal agents surged into mostly Democratic major cities, confrontations between ICE and demonstrators, activists, and immigrants led to violence — especially after the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti during ICE’s Operation Metro Surge in Minneapolis over the winter.

The outrage over the shootings led to operational guidance emphasizing de-escalation and reducing confrontations during field operations, with several field offices even briefly suspending proactive street enforcement or vehicle-stop tactics following orders of ICE upper management.

Since Operation Metro Surge’s end in mid-February, ICE has focused on smaller, decentralized “at-large” enforcement operations under the leadership of new Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, a strategy that has allowed ICE to, until recently, operate with a lower profile, while maintaining previous arrest quotas.

The post ICE Orders an End to Vehicle Stops After Deadly Shootings by Federal Agents appeared first on The Intercept.

Governor Kathy Hochul issues executive order enacting a moratorium on the large, resource-intensive AI facilities

New York became the first US state to enact a moratorium on new datacenters on Tuesday.

Governor Kathy Hochul issued an executive order mandating a one-year statewide pause on the large facilities used to power artificial intelligence products, which she signed at a mid-morning press conference.

Deaths of Joan Sebastian Guerrero and Lorenzo Salgado Araujo have prompted calls for independent investigations

Federal immigration officials have been instructed to stop pulling over vehicles until further notice, according to a homeland security source, following two recent deadly shootings in Texas and Maine during which officials shot and killed immigrants in vehicles.

Other news outlets, including Fox News and CNN, confirmed that officials nationwide received the instructions, with the former reporting some vehicle stops would be allowed to target “the most egregious criminal aliens”.

Former White House counsel Kathy Ruemmler worked with Epstein on a Swiss bank settlement.

For the second time in a week, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have shot a man dead. Joan Sebastian Guerrero, a 26-year-old father from Colombia, was driving slowly in Biddeford, Maine, when an agent shot into his vehicle.

As is now par for the course, ICE representatives are already lying about the incident. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin reportedly at first told Maine Sen. Angus King that the driver had attempted to use his car as a weapon — the same lie used to justify shooting 52-year-old Lorenzo Salgado Araujo dead just one week ago in Houston and Renee Good months before that. ICE has made the same bogus claim in a number of recorded incidents involving agents shooting into moving cars.

In a contradictory but equally baseless statement, the Department of Homeland Security claimed on X that the “vehicle attempted to flee the scene and, fearing for public safety, an officer discharged his weapon.” An eyewitness told reporters that before the victim died, his face covered in blood, he could be heard saying, “I tried to stop.”

Like Araujo in Texas last week, Guerrero had not been the target of ICE operations. This is not to say that either death would be any more justified had ICE been seeking the men for arrest; no immigration violation should carry a death sentence. But both shootings highlight the agency’s pattern of violent racial profiling and reckless indifference to human life.

Thousands protested in Houston following Araujo’s killing. Immediately after news spread of the Maine shooting, protesters took to the streets and rushed to Republican Sen. Susan Collins’s Biddeford office. Collins cast a deciding vote in the Senate last month to deliver a staggering $70 billion in funding over three years to ICE and Border Patrol. “Vote her out,” the demonstrators chanted.

Every elected official who is complicit in this border regime should be ousted. It should be a minimum requirement for Democrats running for Congress that they commit to abolishing ICE. Wherever there is legislative, municipal, city, or local power to do so, political leaders must combat ICE with more than words or face organized pressure campaigns and removal.

Following the high-profile ICE killings of Good and Alex Pretti, two Minnesotans, in January, people took to the streets nationwide. Minneapolis residents responded with work stoppages, blockades, and powerful community resistance. The need to escalate organized resistance to ICE nationwide is again all too clear. Community mutual aid networks, neighborhood defenses, mass strikes, and major disruptive protests are as necessary as ever. But all such actions face the challenge of sustainability when opposing President Donald Trump’s endlessly resourced deportation machine.

Related

Trump’s Spaghetti-Against-the-Wall Indictment Against ICE Protesters — and How to Fight It

Guerrero’s killing in Maine is the eighth fatal ICE shooting in Trump’s second term, according to The Trace. At least fifty-two people have died in ICE custody over that same period, which Human Rights Watch called a “soaring mortality rate.” Meanwhile, ICE is further scaling up its quotidian activities to serve Trump’s project of ethnic cleansing: In just five days at the end of June, ICE agents quietly made a reported 10,000 arrests.

The vile spectacle of city-based ICE surges, which were the agency’s calling card under former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, have given way to dispersed but constant round-ups. The terror for immigrant communities is no less acute; the difficulty when it comes to fighting back has only sharpened. It is high time that anti-ICE action receives more robust political and institutional support.

It is not sufficient, for example, for New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani to assert that the New York Police Department does not coordinate with ICE for deportation operations if the NYPD is dispatched to clear streets for ICE vehicles to travel through disruption-free. It is not enough to have a court order in place barring ICE from making arrests at New York City immigration courts if that order isn’t enforced. “Sanctuary city” has to be a label with meaning beyond Trump using it as a slur against blue cities. It’s a promise, one that must also entail taking action against the racist municipal policing under which immigrants suffer and antifascist organizing is targeted.

Houston Mayor John Whitmire vowed last week to “pursue an independent and transparent” local investigation into the ICE shooting in his city. He also said that the federal government has taken control of the evidence, making such an investigation extremely difficult. The idea that the federal government will hold its jackbooted thugs accountable is, of course, utterly laughable.

But so, too, is the idea that an investigation by Houston or Texas law enforcement will deliver justice to Araujo’s loved ones, let alone the millions of people whose lives are being destroyed by the American deportation machine. An independent investigation into ICE killings is not even the floor, it’s the basement.

Related

Trump’s Communist Boogeyman Playbook: Charging Protesters as Terrorists

As the federal government expands extremist efforts to criminalize and imprison antifascist activists and ICE watchers as terrorists, political leaders — especially those who claim to represent so-called sanctuary cities — must step up to support and protect targeted organizers. It is a disgrace, albeit not a surprise, that Democratic leaders have not spoken out against the unprecedented, draconian sentences — ranging from 30 to 100 years in federal prison — handed down to eight people in Texas over an ICE detention center protest.

The struggle against Trump’s border regime will continue to be led by immigrant communities and their neighbors. The front-line work on the neighborhood level remains the most crucial — from street to street, workplace to workplace, building to building — and in collective efforts against detention centers and in the direct surveillance of and confrontation with ICE agents on the ground. No work of legislation or policy can supplant that. But as the stakes for taking part in anti-ICE work heighten, as immigrant round-ups grow and the death counts climb, it’s high time that Democrats join the work of abolishing ICE with everything at their disposal — or be replaced.

The post How ICE Arrests Went Quiet — and Got Even More Deadly appeared first on The Intercept.

"I don't see a lot of evil there," President Trump said of Sen. Lindsey Graham's sudden death over the weekend.

France v Spain build-up and Atlanta police step up security for England v Argentina

Atlanta police are increasing staffing and resources for Wednesday’s World Cup semi-final between England and Argentina.

The department says additional officers will be deployed around the stadium and across the city’s entertainment and high-traffic areas, with large crowds expected before and after the match:

As Atlanta prepares to host an upcoming World Cup semi-final match and welcomes increased numbers of residents and visitors, the Atlanta Police Department has enhanced its citywide public safety and security posture. Additional personnel and resources are already deployed and will continue to be strategically assigned in and around the event venues, entertainment districts, and other high-traffic areas to help ensure a safe and enjoyable experience for everyone. These proactive measures are designed to protect the public, deter criminal activity, and ensure residents and visitors can safely enjoy this historic event.”

IBM shares plunged after the company warned that Q2 revenue and earnings would miss expectations, blaming customers' sudden shift in spending toward AI hardware instead of software services. However, CEO Arvind Krishna did not place all the blame on IBM's customers. The CEO also said it "faltered" by failing to "anticipate the magnitude of the capex reprioritization." "These conditions require our teams to execute perfectly, and this quarter we faltered. We did not adapt and move quickly enough, and numerous large deals failed to close on the timelines we expected, driving the majority of our shortfall." Fast Company reports: In the preliminary report, IBM said that for its second quarter of fiscal 2026, it expects revenue of $17.2 billion, which is up 1%. It also said it expects a Non-GAAP Diluted Earnings Per Share (EPS) of $2.93, up 5%. However, as noted by CNBC, these preliminary results are below what analysts were expecting, which was $17.86 billion in revenue, and an EPS of $3.01, according to FactSet data.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Recent strikes have sent oil prices climbing again, with average gas price per gallon up by $0.70 compared with 2025

Inflation cooled to an annual rate of 3.5% in June as the brief US-Iran ceasefire, which has since ended, brought energy prices down, according to new data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The consumer price index (CPI), which measures a basket of goods and services, has been elevated since the start of the war, largely because of higher energy prices. After mostly staying under 3% since mid-2024, CPI reached a three-year high of 4.2% in May – up from 2.4% in February. Month-over-month, CPI fell 0.8% in June, the largest one-month decrease since April 2020.

US hits targets in port cities of Bushehr and Bandar Abbas while Iran targets Bahrain and Jordan in retaliation

• Middle East crisis live – latest updates

Donald Trump has backed down from a threat that ships would have to pay a 20% fee to the US for “security” in the strait of Hormuz, replacing it with what he described as investment and trade deals with Gulf Arab states as US and Iranian airstrikes resumed for a third day.

The US president said he had decided to scrap the toll “based on highly productive conversations with Middle East leadership”, and touted “massive” investments, just five hours before the toll was due to come into effect. He said the US would continue to blockade Iranian ports.

A group of publishers says Google engaged in a prolific and unprecedented infringement of copyrighted materials.

The US government has been forced to pay billions in refunds to companies that were hit by Donald Trump’s ‘liberation day’ tariffs. The US has paid out $81bn (£61bn) this fiscal year after the supreme court ruled the tariffs were illegal. Lucy Hough speaks to Chris Michael, an international editor for Guardian US

IBM issued profit warning after weak second quarter, triggering selloff in software sector including Microsoft

Shares in IBM plunged more than 25% on Tuesday after the US tech giant released disappointing preliminary second-quarter results. IBM’s stock was on track for an even steeper single-day decline than it suffered during ⁠the 1987 “Black Monday” crash.

IBM had issued a profit warning and blamed shifts in corporate customers’ spending. The company said revenue for the three months ending in June came in at $17.2bn, up just 1% year-over-year.

Google Images has evolved from early text-to-image queries to today's multimodal AI experiences.

The T. rex, nicknamed Gus, is a towering figure, standing at 12.5 feet fall and roughly 38 feet long.

The Trump administration has launched a national crackdown on how school districts handle accusations of sexual misconduct by teachers, following a KQED-ProPublica investigation into California’s teacher disciplinary system.

In guidance issued last week, Secretary of Education Linda McMahon cited the news outlets’ reporting in May that California’s teacher licensing agency has not revoked the professional credentials of at least 67 educators who school districts determined had sexually harassed students or committed other types of sexual misconduct. At least 14 of those educators were rehired by other schools.

McMahon threatened to withhold federal funding from public schools that fail to protect children from teacher sexual misconduct. She called on states and school districts to scrutinize their laws and regulations to prevent educators who have engaged in sexual misconduct involving students from obtaining new positions elsewhere. Citing previous reports by the Government Accountability Office and other studies, McMahon said the Department of Education has observed a “troubling and recurring pattern” of credible reports of sexual abuse and harassment by school employees going uninvestigated. 

“Unfortunately, many administrators and State educational regulators have apparently preferred to sweep these incidents under the rug and have ‘pass[ed] the trash’ to another school,” McMahon wrote in an open letter to state schools chiefs on Friday, referring to teachers who go on to work in different schools after findings of sexual misconduct.

McMahon said the Department of Education intends to increase its monitoring of school systems to ensure that they comply with federal law. The Trump administration will also examine states’ laws and regulations to determine their effectiveness in protecting students, she said. 

The department is investigating 20 school districts over their data collection practices and handling of allegations of staff sexual harassment of students, McMahon announced. Two of the districts — Tulare City and Wilsona — are in central and Southern California, according to a list the department provided to KQED and ProPublica. The Tulare City superintendent has not responded to a request for comment. Wilsona Superintendent Steve Doyle said the district will cooperate fully with the federal review and “is committed to providing a safe and inclusive learning environment for every student.” 

The list, which the Trump administration said was built on 2023-24 civil rights data, also includes districts in Georgia, Michigan, Arizona, Connecticut, Kentucky, New Hampshire, Missouri, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and Washington. 

A spokesperson for Tony Thurmond, California state superintendent of public instruction, said he was not available to comment on the Trump administration’s letter.

California law requires public school teachers who resign or are fired for misconduct to be reported to the Commission on Teacher Credentialing, the state’s educator licensing agency. That agency then decides whether teachers will be disciplined further, including by losing their professional credentials. 

Our look at California’s teacher disciplinary process revealed a pattern of delays and inaction, combined with a lack of transparency, that has allowed educators to continue teaching after school districts reported them to the state for sexual harassment or other sexual misconduct.

That disciplinary process, which is hidden from public view, stands out compared with how California oversees other professionals. The fact that a teacher has been disciplined is noted — along with a red flag icon next to their name — on a state website of credentialed educators, but the database does not explain why. California law prohibits the teacher licensing agency from sharing that information publicly. In contrast, the licensing bodies governing dozens of other professions in California, including doctors, nurses, police officers and lawyers, make the reasons behind disciplinary actions easily accessible on their websites. And at least 12 states, including Oregon, Washington and Florida, do the same for teachers.

California’s system also makes it difficult for school districts to learn the details of prospective employees’ disciplinary histories. Only after the state licensing agency recommends educators be disciplined can prospective employers request a summary of the case and the agency’s findings — if the request is made within five years.

California law does require teaching candidates to provide prospective employers with their complete educational job history and mandates that school districts ask previous employers whether candidates have ever been reported to the state for egregious misconduct. But no state agency is enforcing whether teachers are sharing their full employment records, whether districts are checking for previous misconduct or whether schools are providing the records. 

“Prospective employers have the tools at their disposal to assess whether an individual is fit to be in the classroom,” Anita Fitzhugh, a spokesperson for the Commission on Teacher Credentialing, previously told KQED and ProPublica. “However, the Commission has no legal authority to compel employers to use these tools.” 

Fitzhugh said Monday that state law prevents the agency from formally reviewing allegations of sexual misconduct that districts report to the state unless it also receives an affidavit from alleged victims. “The Commission stands ready to implement any additional public protections that the Legislature authorizes,” she said.

A new California law mandates the creation of a database by next summer that will allow employers to search the names of school support staff, such as bus drivers, custodians and teaching assistants, who are under investigation for or have substantiated complaints of egregious misconduct. But the law does not apply to public school teachers. 

Some critics characterized McMahon’s latest guidance as political rhetoric and grandstanding, given the Trump administration’s gutting of the Education Department and routine dismissal of civil rights cases.

“Staff-on-student predation occurs less frequently than student-on-student harassment and assault. This letter is silent on that,” said Heidi Goldstein, a personnel commissioner of the Berkeley Unified School District and advisory board member of Stop Sexual Assault in Schools, a national nonprofit. “I look at something like this as a wedge issue you’re going to take to schools to weaken union power overall.”

In her letter, McMahon singled out teachers unions as obstructions to legislative reforms to protect children.

“This is yet another example of the Trump administration weaponizing and distorting an issue for political purposes while also systematically dismantling the very offices of the Department of Education that were established to protect the safety and civil rights of students across the nation,” said Maggie Sisco, a spokesperson for the California Teachers Association. 

Read More

He Was Fired for Sexually Harassing Students. California Allowed Him to Keep Teaching Anyway.

California Teacher Previously Fired for Sexual Harassment Is No Longer in the Classroom After New Complaints

McMahon also noted that the Trump administration recently opened an investigation into the Los Angeles Unified School District for an agreement it made with the teachers union to reassign educators accused of sexual misconduct instead of removing them while district officials investigate. But Christy Hagen, a spokesperson for Los Angeles Unified, said “reassignment means an employee is assigned away from students and schools during an investigation.” 

The district “takes all allegations of sexual misconduct and harassment with the utmost seriousness,” Hagen said, and reported allegations are reviewed promptly through a “thorough and impartial process.” 

Los Angeles Unified, California’s largest school district, has yet to release public records requested by KQED reporter Holly McDede two years ago. The First Amendment Coalition, a California nonprofit that advocates for free speech and government transparency, filed a lawsuit on behalf of McDede in May. Hagen said Monday that the district “has responded to requests in accordance with the California Public Records Act.”   

Steve Hilton, the Republican candidate for California governor, said if elected, he would “end the loopholes that let dangerous teachers move from one school district to another.” 

“Agencies will share information, act quickly and put student safety first, not the system,” Hilton said. “If you abuse a child, your teaching career is over.”

Jonathan Underland, spokesperson for Xavier Becerra, the former U.S. health and human services secretary, former California attorney general and the Democratic gubernatorial candidate, said Becerra “will make sure this state has a system that acts swiftly and keeps educators who harm students out of the classroom.”

“Protecting students from predators demands real action — but this president is demanding it from the very office he’s spent years tearing down,” Underland said. “California won’t wait on Washington.”

The post Trump Administration Launches Crackdown on Teacher Sexual Misconduct Following KQED-ProPublica Investigation appeared first on ProPublica.

In an effort to increase my step count while working from home, I tested popular walking pads from Egofit and Costway.

Firework displays cancelled as Paris military parade asserts ‘France’s rearmament … and Europe’s strategic awakening’

Emmanuel Macron has presided over his final Bastille Day parade in Paris amid a searing heatwave and wildfires that forced authorities around the country to cancel traditional firework displays and balls celebrating France’s national day.

The French president was joined for the annual military procession and flypast by his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the British ‌prime minister, Keir Starmer, the German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, and two dozen other national leaders.

Gates has denied any ties to Epstein’s crimes and has not been accused of any wrongdoing

Billionaire Warren Buffett omitted Bill Gates′ foundation from his annual donations this year after disclosures of the Microsoft co-founder’s ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Buffett will donate about $6bn to four foundations connected to his own family, but did not mention Gates in his announcement Tuesday.

Buffett also said in his statement that he wants all of his remaining Berkshire Hathaway stock worth more than $140bn donated to charity by the end of 2034. Previously the plan was for his three children to distribute his remaining fortune within 10 years of the 95-year-old investor’s death.

• US striker’s red card was suspended after Trump calls

• Fifa president accused of breaching neutrality rules

The United States striker Folarin Balogun has revealed he predicted Donald Trump’s involvement in overturning his World Cup suspension would “cause a lot of controversy”.

The Monaco forward was sent off with a red card in the United States’ round-of-32 meeting with Bosnia and Herzegovina, but Fifa’s disciplinary committee then suspended the one-match ban for a year, allowing Balogun to participate in the Americans’ last-16 loss to Belgium.

Neither of the victims of the ICE shootings in Maine or Texas were the target of enforcement operations, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

An ammunition plant in Mesquite, Texas, has not produced any metal projectile parts after the Army spent $469 million to establish the facility.

Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh told the House Financial Services Committee that the central bank has "no tolerance for persistently elevated inflation."

New York has become the first U.S. state to impose a moratorium on large new data centers, pausing construction for one year over concerns that AI-driven data center growth is raising utility bills, straining water supplies, and burdening communities. "As data center development threatens to hike up utility bills, deplete our natural resources, and create uncertainty for New Yorkers, it's my responsibility to take action and lead," said New York Governor Kathy Hochul. She will also pursue legislation to repeal sales tax exemptions for large data centers, Hochul added. Reuters reports: The construction ban will apply to data centers that use 50 megawatts or more of power, officials in the governor's office said. During the moratorium, the state's Department of Environmental Conservation will not issue any discretionary permits not already deemed complete, the governor's office said. Instead, Hochul directed state officials to develop a Generic Environmental Impact Statement to ensure that new data centers coming online are held to "consistent standards," as well as examine the potential environmental impacts of the construction and operation of data centers in the state. The ban will be lifted once the state finalizes those standards, according to Hochul's office.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Asked about the case of U.S. national Youlin Chen, China's foreign ministry said there was no "wrongful detention," but it did not deny the scientist was imprisoned.

Whether you're craving international treats or healthy ingredients that won't cause a sugar crash, these subscription boxes are CNET's favorites.

More than 158,000 items of fake kit seized featuring World Cup semi-finalists England, France and Spain

More than 158,000 fake football strips have been seized in an operation targeting World Cup counterfeit kit and blocking criminals from trying to “cash in on fan demand”.

Edinburgh’s trading standards team confiscated 9 tonnes of Scotland, England and other nations’ fake kits, worth an estimated £5.5m.

US government says it wants to ‘systematically disable’ The Hague-based international criminal court

A spokesperson for the EU has pushed back against the Trump administration’s assertion that the international criminal court poses a threat to US sovereignty, a day after the US government said it would work to “systematically disable” a global tribunal that seeks to prosecute the perpetrators of the world’s gravest crimes.

Anouar El Anouni, an EU spokesperson, said on Tuesday: “We stand firm in our support for the international criminal court (ICC). Attacks or threats against the court, elected officials, personnel or those cooperating with the court are simply not acceptable.”

Graham had carried the reputation as the toughest Russia hawk in Washington since the 2018 death of his close friend and Senate ally John McCain.

Shortly before Maya "May" Millete vanished, authorities say her husband Larry messaged a spellcaster, "Please punish May and incapacitate her enough so she can't leave the house."

The latest leak for the Pixel 11 reveals key changes to the base model.

Exclusive: Emmanuel Macron honours outgoing prime minister for leadership role in supporting Ukraine

Keir Starmer has become the first UK prime minister to be presented with the Légion d’honneur by a French president, in recognition of his work with France on the security of Europe.

Emmanuel Macron awarded the historic honour to Starmer for his leadership in setting up the coalition of the willing – a group of countries chaired by France and the UK that have pledged to support Ukraine – at a critical moment for Europe in early 2025.

A California mother disappears without a trace – did her husband try to have a hex put on her so she wouldn't leave him?

The reported infections are the latest in a series of health concerns at the federal immigration jail in Aurora

At least 12 people detained at a federal immigration jail in Colorado have contracted tuberculosis in recent days, according to testimony from inside the facility where dozens of others have reportedly been placed in quarantine.

Those affected by the outbreak are also being made to endure their isolation without air conditioning, one detainee who has been at the facility in Aurora since December told the Guardian, through his partner, in a telephone call on Monday afternoon.

Skeleton judged to be one of the largest and most complete ever unearthed was excavated on a ranch in South Dakota

A vast, fossilized Tyrannosaurus rex nicknamed Gus sold at Sotheby’s in New York on Tuesday for $50.1m with fees (£37.4m) to a phone bidder – making it the most valuable dinosaur fossil sold at auction.

It also sold well above a pre-sale estimate of $20m to $30m (£15m to £22.4m).

Rapper paid JM Burkman & Associates $600,000 to push for president’s pardon but firm says no partial refund promised

Louisiana rapper Boosie Badazz is reportedly looking to claw back $300,000 from a firm of Washington DC lobbyists after they failed to secure a Donald Trump pardon that he hired them to pursue over his conviction on charges of possessing a loaded weapon at music video shooting in 2023.

Boosie – whose legal name is Torence Hatch and who hails from his home state’s capital of Baton Rouge – paid JM Burkman & Associates $600,000 in 2025 to advance his push for a pardon from the US president, according to a report on Monday from Notus, which covers the federal government.

Investigators say her Larry Millete contacted spellcasters to try to put a hex on his wife Maya so she wouldn't leave him.

Sharing a bank account could mean sharing exposure to a partner's unpaid debts. How does that work, though?

Funds released from escrow account after Trump’s efforts to block sexual abuse and defamation award fail

A Manhattan federal court has released more than $5.6m that Donald Trump owes E Jean Carroll in her successful 2023 sexual abuse and defamation trial against him, records reveal.

The disbursement, made public in a 14 July entry on Carroll’s case docket, indicates that the funds were released by a court-held account on 9 July – one day after judge Lewis Kaplan ordered the release of this money.

Trump, who has been fighting against the release of this money since June after the supreme court on 29 June denied his request to hear his appeal, has denied wrongdoing.

“Three years ago, a unanimous nine-person jury found President Trump liable for sexually assaulting and defaming E Jean Carroll. Today, we are pleased to report that she has received the damages payment the jury awarded her as a result of that verdict,” Roberta Kaplan, Carroll’s lead lawyer, said in a statement.

United Airlines has a solution to passengers squabbling over who gets the armrest: empty middle seats.

Almost 6,000 young men apply to be excluded on moral or religious grounds despite ‘conscription lite’ policy

The number of young men applying to be conscientious objectors and refuse armed military service in Germany has risen sharply this year, undermining a drive by Berlin to create Europe’s strongest conventional army and deter the Russian threat.

More people had applied to exclude themselves from service on religious or moral grounds in the first half of 2026 than in the whole of last year, according to figures provided by the government on Tuesday.

• Six-time Olympic medalist resumes training

• Tokyo all-around champion targets LA 2028

• Latest Paris gold medalist planning comeback

Suni Lee is making a run at a third Olympics.

The America gymnastics star announced she is returning to the sport on Tuesday, about two years out from the Los Angeles Games.

Chair criticises use of ‘VIP lane’ to prioritise PPE contracts for companies with Tory connections in damning report

• ‘Catastrophic failure’: UK Covid families welcome inquiry findings on PPE

Boris Johnson’s government wasted £10bn of public money because of the flawed way it went about buying personal protective equipment during the coronavirus pandemic, an official inquiry has concluded.

The Covid-19 inquiry chair, Heather Hallett, also criticised the then Conservative government’s controversial “VIP lane”, which gave high priority for PPE contracts to companies with political connections to the Tories.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: StubHub and its CEO, Eric Baker, have been hit with a proposed $5-million class-action lawsuit in the United States over the company's ties to large-scale scalpers -- connections reported by CBC News last week. The suit, filed Monday by New York ticket buyer Louis Sanquini, alleges deceptive practices and fraudulent misrepresentation over StubHub's promoting itself as a "marketplace for fans to buy and sell tickets." The online ticket resale giant has faced a storm of customer complaints after cancelling thousands of World Cup tickets. The company has repeatedly said it is simply a technology platform that does not buy, sell or possess tickets. However, CBC reported last week that Baker disclosed in recent filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that he runs Andro Capital, a hedge fund that engages in large-scale resale of millions of dollars' worth of sports and concert tickets on the StubHub resale platform. Sanquini filed the proposed class action in the Southern District of New York, arguing consumers were kept in the dark and that he believed StubHub was a "neutral" marketplace. Lead counsel Kevin Steinberg told CBC News in an emailed statement that "consumers deserve honesty and transparency." A CBC investigation found that the CEO of online ticket reseller StubHub owns and manages a hedge fund that scalps millions of dollars of its own tickets. "While what StubHub is alleged to have engaged in and perpetrated upon millions of patrons is unfathomable, this case is about transparency and consumer trust. If companies make representations to the public, consumers are entitled to expect that those representations are complete and accurate," he said. The claim reads: "Defendants' failure to disclose this conflict of interest, while affirmatively marketing StubHub as a fan-to-fan marketplace, deceived Plaintiff and the Class and caused them to pay prices, and accept terms, they would not have accepted had the truth been known." Sanquini argues that had he known StubHub's CEO held a financial interest and that the company was helping finance professional resellers, he would never have used the resale site to buy tickets to see rock band Kiss in 2023 or to attend a New York Red Bulls-New York City FC Major League Soccer match in 2024.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Industry insiders say "there is no legal basis" for Trump to impose a 20% fee on cargo transiting the Strait of Hormuz, which could cost tens of millions of dollars per ship.

Defendant pleads guilty to crimes over the course of 12 years, some of which also involved ‘a person unknown’

A man has been told he faces a possible life sentence after pleading guilty to 32 sexual offences against his girlfriend while she was allegedly drugged or asleep, including some attacks he recorded.

The defendant, aged in his 40s, who cannot be named for legal reasons, appeared at Northampton crown court on Tuesday where he admitted the offences, which happened over more than a decade between January 2014 and September last year.

U.S. soccer star Folarin Balogun told "CBS Mornings" he "was in shock" when he received a red card in a World Cup match and discussed FIFA's decision to lift the one-game ban.

Campaigners feel vindicated by some of report’s conclusions but are unconvinced by its verdict on ‘VIP lane’

• Johnson government wasted £10bn on PPE, Covid inquiry finds

In the slightly incongruous setting of south London’s splendid Kia Oval cricket stadium, Naomi Fulop gathered her strength to give the assembled British media her response to the damning findings of Heather Hallett’s latest Covid inquiry report.

Reading a statement from her mobile phone, her voice quivering just a little, as fellow members of the Covid Bereaved Families for Justice (CBFFJ) group stood alongside her, Fulop recalled the terrible time when her mother died from coronavirus in January 2021. It was in the second lethal wave of the pandemic, a vaccine still a far-off aspiration, during the third national lockdown. Like so many other people, Fulop believes her mother died because those caring for her did not have adequate personal protective equipment (PPE), a belief supported by the findings of Lady Hallett, a former court of appeal judge.

His facial hair fixation might seem perplexing – but it is part of an aestheticisation of politics that is central to the Trump project

The year is 2018 and Pete Hegseth has just come back from his summer holidays. Hegseth, who is still just a Fox News host, not a defense secretary keen on ordering possible war crimes, has grown a nice little beard during his time off. He is hoping his bosses at Fox might let him keep the facial hair, even if it’s just the moustache. He seems to think it makes him look quite dapper. Alas, some of his viewers disagree.

A woman called Patti writes in to Fox & Friends urging him to get that “fur” off his face. A viewer called Mary bemoans the fact that “all American cute” Pete now looks “awful”. People on the internet joke that he looks like a duck hunter. And then a final humiliation: Hegseth’s co-hosts cackle as his vacation beard is lopped off by a barber live on daytime TV. “A man without a beard is like a lion without a mane,” a Fox fan called Michael commiserates. “That’s how I feel!” Hegseth wails.

U.S. health officials are concerned about the spread of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Oil prices hit four-week highs and European shares fall after fresh US-Iran attacks and blockade on Iranian shipping

Crude oil prices have hit their highest levels in four weeks, as Washington and Tehran traded attacks and the US reimposed a naval blockade of Iran.

Brent crude has jumped $3.79 a barrel to $87.08 a barrel, a 4.55% increase, the highest since 12 June, before the ceasefire. The US and Iran signed a memorandum of understanding to end the conflict on 17 June and engaged in negotiations for a permanent peace deal.

What we think is that the peak of the escalation is behind us, but there are upside risks to oil prices if these disruptions continue and that will keep prices in the $85-$90 range.

But I would have ‌added the very strong caveat to that it seems to me ‌that the situation remained unstable, and the ceasefire was fragile.

Money from rail selloff could help solve Ohio city’s most pressing problems but political mistrust dictates how profits can be used

Cincinnati, Ohio’s City of Seven Hills, has been drawing residents in from its suburbs – and, increasingly, other large cities – for years now. The only flat thing in sight is the housing supply.

“Our city’s growing,” Aftab Pureval, Cincinnati’s mayor, said in an interview. “For the first time in a generation, our population is growing.”

Trump’s threats – and U-turn – on Hormuz fees further undermine US credibility in the Gulf Expert comment jon.wallace 14 July 2026

International law does not permit any country to appoint itself ‘guardian’ of other states’ rights and demand payment. The only realistic solution to the situation in the Strait is a return to negotiations.

On 13 July President Donald Trump appointed the United States the ‘Guardian’ of the Strait of Hormuz. The US would ensure passage through the Strait, he announced, but would ‘as a matter of FAIRNESS’ demand a payment of 20 per cent of the value of the cargo carried by each passing vessel. 

This could be up to $30 million per passage for a large oil tanker – an exorbitant amount and 15 times the sum Iran has reportedly demanded in tolls. It would be a reimbursement ‘for any and all costs necessary to do the job of providing safety and security to this very volatile section of the world,’ Trump added.

The president matched this announcement in the same post by re-imposing the US blockade of Iranian vessels and maritime traffic destined for Iran. In response, Iran confirmed that it would close the Strait again. In essence, this means that shipping has returned to the status it had before the ceasefire agreed by the US and Iran in the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) of 17 June.

Of course, international law does not allow any country, however powerful it may be, to appoint itself ‘guardian’ of the rights of all other states, and demand payment for such unsolicited protection. And the president’s move contradicted the statements of his senior officials, undermining US credibility in the region. 

On 14 July, a new post by the president appeared to reverse his position, saying that he had decided to replace the reimbursement fee ‘with Trade and Investment Deals that the various Gulf States will be making into the United States’. 

This U-turn will not undo the damage his fees threat has done to trust in the US, and to its supposedly principled position in defence of free maritime transit through international straits. 

Meanwhile the only viable solution to restoring shipping in the Strait of Hormuz remains a negotiated settlement – a prospect made even more difficult by the risk of further escalation of the renewed military conflict.

Negotiations for control of the Strait

In the MoU, the US surprisingly conceded that Iran would restore freedom of navigation without charge ‘for 60 days only’. Afterwards, the MoU stated, Iran and Oman would ‘define the future administration and maritime services’ in relation to the Strait.

The MoU referred to international law and the interest of other Gulf states. But it also emphasized the ‘sovereign rights of coastal states in the Strait of Hormuz.’ Iran might be forgiven for thinking that by agreeing to this language, the US had caved in to its demand for control over the Strait. It has certainly behaved as if it does.

It is true, every coastal state enjoys sovereign rights over its territorial seas up to 12 nautical miles from its coast. However, where a strait used for international navigation traverses the territorial sea of any country, that state must grant unhindered passage to shipping of all flag states. 

There is therefore no room in international law for Iran’s attempts to extract tolls, or for a similar and even more exaggerated attempt by the White House. 

Routes through the Strait

Iran persists in its claim to have moved the Strait’s sea lanes northwards, closer to its coastline and falling still further within its territorial waters.

But the original routing through the middle of the Strait was agreed as far back as 1966 with the International Maritime Organization (IMO) – the actual guardian of maritime freedoms – and cannot simply be changed by one state at the expense of all shipping nations.

The US and Oman, with the involvement of the IMO, responded to Iran’s claim by moving the sea lane southwards, hugging the Omani coast and mainly traversing its territorial waters. Iran has tried to oppose this US attempt to reduce its power over passage by mounting occasional missile and drone attacks against shipping seeking to use the US/ Omani route.

Last week, Oman hosted negotiations on this issue, supported by mediation from Qatar and others and legal drafting from Europe. A compromise would have been obvious: to return to the approved, original sea lane towards the middle of the Strait.

To facilitate this, experts supporting the negotiations proposed a compromise on the ‘Malacca Strait model.’ In that busy shipping route, coastal states do not collect tolls merely for passage. Instead, a reasonable fee is collected for pilotage and perhaps the provision of navigational aids and other services, with the approval of the affected maritime states.

Control over this arrangement could be exercised by a joint Iranian and Omani body, perhaps with some international representation. It would ensure that the fees remain proportionate to the services rendered and that the scheme is administered without discrimination, for instance against ‘hostile flag-states,’ which might include Israel or the US. 

However, Iran remained intransigent in the negotiations, and no agreement was reached.

Trump’s fees

President Trump’s proposal to levy vast and disproportionate fees on shipping appeared once again as if the US was seeking to make money out of an emergency suffered by others, including those desperate for the importation of oil and fertilizers. In that respect it was reminiscent of the minerals agreement pressed onto Ukraine last year. 

The president’s fees announcement was immediately opposed by the IMO, which emphasized that it opposes all charging of mandatory fees for passage through straits used for international navigation. Trump’s reference to the fact that Iran started this crisis by demanding tolls is not relevant. The fact that someone observes another stealing a car does not authorize that observer to steal one as well. And ultimately this crisis was brought about by the US and Israeli attack on Iran in February in the first place. 

The Trump scheme was not realistic and clearly met stiff resistance from Gulf states, further undermining the White House’s diplomacy in the Gulf. Secretary of State Marco Rubio stated in June, referencing international law, that no toll would be allowed for passage through the Strait. 

Trump’s governance by Truth Social has undercut this position yet again. His almost immediate change of heart highlights how capricious the US president remains and how little can be invested in the statements of his most senior diplomatic officials. Trump’s backing down from an attempt to impose fees avoids further damage to maritime freedoms on the part of the US – but it has certainly further eroded US credibility. This will also weaken the US position in opposition to Iran’s demand for tolls. After all, the US president had demanded them fifteen-fold. 

Rowing back

Some form of row back on the president’s statement was inevitable. His plan was unlawful and pure fantasy. Ships would have faced considerable risk in making a passage of the Strait opposed by Iran, even under US protection. Few ship owners would have risked vessels, cargo and crew in a narrow sea lane under constant threat of Iranian attack or mines. 

Moreover, a charge of anything like 20 per cent of the value of the cargo would not have been a commercially viable proposition for the ship owners and their clients. The Gulf states and their offer of investments give Trump cover and an excuse for a rapid retreat from his unsustainable position. 

Related work

Why demining the Strait of Hormuz will be difficult – but also presents an opportunity

However, this leaves the situation in Hormuz uncertain, as US–Iran hostilities escalate and maritime traffic slows once again.

It is now time for the grown-ups to intervene more decisively. The only realistic approach for a solution must lie in the resumption of negotiations to regulate shipping through the Strait and to return to a ceasefire. 

Other countries such as China could make a significant contribution by finally applying pressure in favour of restoring the maritime freedoms on which they also depend.

There can be no Iranian control of passage or tolls. But there can be a face-saving arrangement for limited fees charged in proportion to expenses made in assuring safety of navigation, protection against environmental damage, and other reasonable expenses. And Europe, with leadership from the UK, can take a role in securing freedom of navigation once a deal is finally done – without seeking to impose a charge upon the world in consequence.

US refusal to renew USMCA trade deal brings uncertainty for Mexico. But the treaty is far from dead Expert comment LToremark 14 July 2026

The US–Mexico–Canada agreement now faces a decade of annual reviews. But the fact that the treaty will remain in place during negotiations is the most important outcome.

On 1 July, the US announced it would not renew the US–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA) free trade deal in its current form. Mexico and Canada had each confirmed that they wished to extend the agreement for a further 16-year term, but the US declined. Its trade representative, Ambassador Jamieson Greer, said Washington would keep working with Mexico and Canada to address the agreement’s shortcomings and the trade imbalances with both. Crucially, the USMCA stays in effect while those matters are worked through. 

The USMCA will now be reviewed annually until 2036. But the Trump administration’s volatile policies intertwining trade and security matters will add to the complexity of these negotiations – especially for Mexico.

US–Mexico trade: from NAFTA to USMCA to tariff uncertainty

The USMCA replaced the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), in place between 1994 and 2020. US president Donald Trump referred to NAFTA as the ‘worst trade deal ever’, and during his first term he set out to replace it with a new deal. After three years of negotiations, the USMCA came into effect in 2020.

But since Trump returned to the White House last year, things have changed. There is renewed focus on industrial policy and domestic manufacturing, exacerbated commercial tensions with China, and use of tariffs to bring about improvements in non-trade areas such as national security. In this context, trade and diplomatic relations between the US and Mexico have become increasingly rocky and volatile. 

Related work

Despite Trump’s threats, Mexico is of fundamental importance to the US economy

On ‘Liberation Day’ on 2 April 2025, Trump announced tariffs of 25 per cent on non-USMCA-compliant goods and 10 per cent on non-compliant energy against Mexico for its failure to stop flows of illegal migration and drugs across the border. Since then, Mexican officials have engaged in a series of negotiations, both through diplomatic and back channels, to achieve three main goals: preserve the free trade framework, cancel or reduce new tariffs and give as much certainty as possible to the future of the USMCA. 

So far, Mexico has been relatively successful in achieving these aims: most of the conversations have revolved not around the cancellation of the agreement – as with NAFTA – but rather around a renegotiation. Although different from the ideal outcome stated in the treaty – a ‘simple’ revision – it is not as existentially damaging as an abolition. 

Although US tariffs on Mexico are higher than before Donald Trump’s second term, they are far more competitive than those facing the rest of the world. Around 88 per cent of Mexican exports to the US enter duty-free under the USMCA. As a result, even though the headline rates on some sectors are steep – such as 25 per cent on steel and aluminium – the weighted-average effective tariff on Mexican exports is only about 3.4 per cent.  By way of comparison, the average effective tariff on Chinese exports to the US now stands at about 22 per cent, while comparable economies such as India and Brazil face 8.4 per cent and 10.6 per cent respectively.

Mexico is also the main trading partner of the US and ranks between the first and third largest trading partner for 36 out of the 50 states, while the US accounts for roughly 80 per cent of Mexican exports. Meanwhile, migration flows have been significantly reduced from more than 2 million encounters reported by US authorities in 2022 to 237,538 in 2025, while US fentanyl deaths were halved during the same period, giving the US grounds to suspend new tariffs. 

Mexico therefore retains a clear comparative advantage – preserving it should be the cornerstone of its strategy when negotiating the future of the USMCA. 

Negotiating the future of the USMCA

Negotiations between the US and its two treaty partners have thus far been predominantly bilateral, although both Mexico and Canada are pushing for more trilateral talks. 

For Mexico, given the extreme uncertainty that characterizes US actions towards Mexico, the government should make every effort to truly understand US priorities and rationale. Understanding the motivations behind Washington’s actions will help determine Mexico’s room for manoeuvre in the negotiations. President Claudia Sheinbaum has also stressed the need to ‘keep a cool head’ when navigating tensions with US. Mexican officials must understand Washington’s concerns in relation to trade deficits and how Mexico is positioned in that rhetoric – but they must also stress Mexico’s stance of cooperation without subordination. Having as much clarity as possible will help distinguish noise from reality in the years of negotiations ahead. 

The US refusing to renew the USMCA was a disappointing but expected outcome, given the new context in which no country is exempt from Trump’s tariffs – not even treaty partners. The fact that the treaty will remain in place during the renegotiation is hugely significant in its own right. What is up for negotiation is for how long, what kind of treaty, and how often it is reviewed. 

The first point, the duration, was resolved in principle. The USMCA will remain in place for at least 10 more years, until 2036, unless the parties agree on something different in the coming years of negotiations. If the parties have not reached an agreement by 2036, the treaty will expire – although it seems unlikely this would be allowed to happen without something else in place given the importance of North American trade and economic integration. 

What kind of treaty it is will depend on the outcome of the negotiations. However, it is important to remember that there will still be tariffs – and markets know this. Mexico is likely to continue bilateral negotiations in which Washington presses for measures to narrow its trade deficit, raise US content in regional supply chains and tighten the rules of origin to curb trans-shipment, among other demands. Mexico, in turn, will push to broaden the USMCA tariff exemptions. The aim of its negotiators will be to confine tariffs to as few sectors as possible, and to keep them as low as possible. 

Much of the U.S. is facing either extreme heat or excessive rainfall and potential flooding on Tuesday. Here's where the greatest threats are expected.

Biden sued ex-CEO of Overstock.com Patrick Byrne over claim that Biden sought bribe from Iran government in 2021

Hunter Biden says he is “grateful that the rule of law prevailed” in a defamation lawsuit that recently netted him a judgment of $1.7m in punitive damages from the former Overstock.com CEO Patrick Byrne.

Biden made that comment in a social media post that served as his first comments about the judgment, which a federal judge in California handed down on Friday.

Conviction over hiring by socialist-led council is one of a series of corruption claims facing Pedro Sánchez’s family

The brother of Spain’s prime minister has been banned from holding public office for nine years after being found guilty of administrative misconduct relating to his hiring by a socialist-led council in the south-western region of Extremadura nine years ago.

Corruption allegations involving Pedro Sánchez’s family, his government and his Spanish Socialist Workers’ party (PSOE) have triggered repeated opposition calls for a snap general election. All the accused have denied wrongdoing.

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho, July 14, 2026 — For the first time, researchers from Idaho National Laboratory, the Grainger College of Engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and Purdue University used a geographically distributed control system to remotely and automatically adjust the power of a research reactor in real time, with the reactor’s own safety systems retaining full control throughout.

Using INL’s high performance computing systems, researchers remotely adjusted the power of a Purdue University research reactor in real time for the first time. Credit: INL.

Working with PUR1, a low-power research reactor at Purdue, the team first demonstrated remote power adjustments through an automatic adjustment system called a digital control loop, then made the loop further autonomous using a reinforcement learning model running in software that simulates how physical forces interact within the reactor. The demonstration linked three sites operating together in real time: high-performance computing systems in Idaho, the PUR1 reactor in Indiana, and a Microsoft Azure cloud environment in Virginia.

“Researching autonomous operations is essential to the future of nuclear energy; it’s a key component of making future nuclear power plants safer, more efficient, and more reliable,” said Chris Ritter, Scientific Computing and AI division director at INL. “The idea is that if you can model a reactor with enough fidelity, you can eventually let AI safely assist in operating it. The safety case is what makes this real: the system analyzes, predicts, and adjusts, but the reactor’s own safety controls always have the final say in this experiment.”

During this demonstration, the team calculated and delivered instructions for the movement of an auxiliary control rod through INL’s DeepLynx, an advanced data and control platform, using cloud-based connectivity with the PUR1 digital twin, and INL high-performance computing systems. From Idaho Falls, Idaho, the team fine-tuned reactor power to minimize small power fluctuations and maintained steady reactor operation. The team demonstrated these live autonomous reactor adjustments without any manual control-rod manipulation on site.

“This advancement greatly expands the kinds of experiments and control system research we can perform at PUR1,” said Stylianos Chatzidakis, assistant professor in the School of Nuclear Engineering and associate reactor director of PUR1 at Purdue. “Collaborations with national laboratories strengthen our ability to explore innovative reactor technologies and train the next generation of nuclear engineers.”

This milestone builds on digital twin technology originally demonstrated in 2023 and reactor secure communications demonstrated in 2025. Funded through the Laboratory Directed Research and Development program, this system analyzes conditions, predicts outcomes and adjusts autonomously, acting as a smart bridge that links virtual models to physical systems without overriding essential safety protections. This approach aligns with Nuclear Regulatory Commission requirements by operating alongside, not in place of, the reactor’s safety control systems.

“Nuclear energy technology is being reimagined from all angles. This platform will play a key role in understanding and optimizing the details of integrating these emerging designs with the applications that are building the backbone of our economy,” said Timothy Grunloh, associate director of the Illinois Nuclear Power Institute at the University of Illinois.

“Our capabilities enable organizations to harness advanced technologies, especially AI, to drive real, scalable change across the energy sector and other high impact industries,” said Microsoft Senior Director for U.S. Federal AI Nelli Babayan. “We’re unifying data, accelerating innovation and delivering more efficient, sustainable solutions.”

The demonstration shows how digital infrastructure can support advanced nuclear science and technology. Remote and autonomous operation of the PUR1 reactor directly advances the Genesis Mission challenge Delivering Nuclear Energy that is Faster, Safer, Cheaper, the Department of Energy’s national effort to use AI to accelerate nuclear energy design, licensing, manufacturing, construction, and operation with human-in-the-loop workflows.

About University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

The Grainger College of Engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign is one of the world’s top-ranked institutions and a globally recognized leader in engineering and computing education, research and public engagement. With a diverse, tight-knit community of faculty, students and alumni, Grainger Engineering sets the standard for excellence in engineering and computing, driving innovation in the economy and bringing revolutionary ideas to the world. Through robust research and discovery, our faculty, staff, students and alumni are changing our world and making advances once only dreamed about, including the MRI, LED, ILIAC, Mosaic, YouTube, PayPal, flexible electronics, electric machinery, miniature batteries, imaging the black hole and flight on Mars. The world’s brightest minds from The Grainger College of Engineering tackle today’s toughest challenges. And they are building a better, cooler, safer tomorrow. Visit the Grainger Engineering website for more information.

About Purdue University

Purdue University is a public research university leading with excellence at scale. Ranked among top 10 public universities in the United States, Purdue discovers, disseminates and deploys knowledge with a quality and at a scale second to none. More than 106,000 students study at Purdue across multiple campuses, locations and modalities, including more than 57,000 at our main campus locations in West Lafayette and Indianapolis. Committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue’s main campus has frozen tuition 14 years in a row. See how Purdue never stops in the persistent pursuit of the next giant leap — including its integrated, comprehensive Indianapolis urban expansion; the Mitch Daniels School of Business; Purdue Computes; and the One Health initiative — at https://www.purdue.edu/president/strategic-initiatives.

About Idaho National Laboratory

Battelle Energy Alliance manages INL for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy. INL is the nation’s center for nuclear energy research and development, and also performs research in each of DOE’s strategic goal areas: energy, national security, science and the environment. For more information, visit www.inl.gov.

Source: INL

The post INL Links HPC, AI and Digital Twin to Control Research Reactor Remotely appeared first on HPCwire.

LEIXLIP, Ireland, July 13, 2026 — Intel has announced a €5 billion ($5.7 billion) capital investment at its Leixlip campus in Ireland, marking the next phase in the site’s capacity expansion.

Global demand for AI and high-performance computing is driving the need for advanced silicon to power AI Factories, and Intel is scaling capacity in Ireland to deliver Intel Xeon 6 and next gen Intel Xeon built on its Intel 3 node. This strategic investment expands current production output, advances research and development activities and utilizes capacity across existing cleanroom space, strengthening Europe’s semiconductor supply chain and serving industry need.

Investment is expected to create permanent high-tech jobs and engage specialized tradespeople, while expanding leading-edge manufacturing capacity in Ireland. Credit: Intel.

The expansion involves upgrading existing fabrication facilities and the installation of leading-edge manufacturing equipment. Key infrastructure enhancements include the expansion of the automated track system to integrate disparate campus modules into a singular, high-velocity production environment.

The execution of this €5 billion capital expenditure program began earlier this year. This project is expected to engage specialized tradespeople across construction and equipment install, in addition to full-time high-tech jobs at Intel.

Naga Chandrasekaran, Executive Vice President, Chief Technology and Operations Officer and General Manager of Intel Foundry said, “This €5 billion investment represents a definitive commitment to maximize capacity at our Leixlip campus and increase what we can deliver to Intel Foundry customers.”

“By investing in our existing fabs with state-of-the-art technology and installing cutting-edge tools, we are not just increasing output of critical products like Xeon 6 and next gen Intel Xeon processors built on Intel 3, we are ensuring that Ireland remains at the forefront of the world’s most advanced manufacturing ecosystems, while strengthening the region’s role in the global technology landscape.”

This commitment supports a key pillar to grow and strengthen Ireland’s semiconductor ecosystem, positioning Ireland as a leading European manufacturing hub. It further serves as a critical contribution to the European Union’s Tech-Sovereignty ambitions, facilitating a resilient, domestic supply of leading-edge processors.

Intel has invested more than €30 billion in Ireland since establishing operations in 1989, with the Leixlip campus serving as one of the company’s most advanced manufacturing facilities. The site employs 4,900 people and has been at the forefront of semiconductor innovation, contributing significantly to Ireland’s reputation as a global technology hub.

Welcoming the announcement, An Taoiseach, Micheál Martin T.D. said: “Intel’s latest multi-billion-euro investment in Leixlip is a powerful vote of confidence in Ireland, our skills base and our position at the heart of Europe’s most advanced manufacturing ecosystem. At a time of rapid technological change and global competition, this expansion strengthens Ireland’s role in securing resilient semiconductor supply chains and reinforces our ambition to remain a global leader in innovation, productivity and sustainable economic growth.”

IDA Ireland CEO Michael Lohan said: “Intel is one of Ireland’s longest standing and most strategically important investors. This project demonstrates the value of Ireland’s skilled workforce, innovation ecosystem and stable business environment, while reinforcing Ireland’s leadership in advanced semiconductor manufacturing, supporting both European competitiveness and resilient global supply chains.”

About Intel

Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) designs and manufactures advanced semiconductors that connect and power the modern world. Every day, our engineers create new technologies that enhance and shape the future of computing to enable new possibilities for every customer we serve. Learn more at intel.com.

Source: Intel

The post Intel Invests €5B to Expand Manufacturing in Europe appeared first on HPCwire.

UK fears a ‘triple whammy’: oversized investment in AI stocks, slower adoption of AI than predicted and the breakneck pace of AI’s development

Hello, and welcome to TechScape. I’m your host, Blake Montgomery, US tech editor at the Guardian. Today, we’re discussing the UK’s difficult position in the AI race, new doubts over OpenAI’s path toward a trillion-dollar stock market debut and the changes to IRL tech reporting in the age of AI.

My patients use ChatGPT for therapy. Now I use it too | Sarah Darghouth | The Guardian

Chasing new skills, going back to basics and pushing for collective action: how software engineers are adapting to AI

ALBUQUERQUE, July 14, 2026 — Economic Development New Mexico’s Technology & Innovation Office (TIO) has awarded $1.2 million to six companies through the New Mexico Quantum Technologies Award, a competitive grant program that supports early-stage quantum and quantum-enabling technology companies growing operations in the state.

Credit: Shutterstock

The New Mexico Quantum Technologies Award provides grants of up to $200,000 to support early-stage quantum companies committed to growing in New Mexico. All six awardees must maintain operations in the state for at least two years beyond the grant period, with two companies establishing a New Mexico presence through the grant program.

“These awards build directly on the momentum in New Mexico’s quantum sector, which was recently recognized by the Federal Laboratory Consortium,” said Economic Development Cabinet Secretary Rob Black. “Each company we support strengthens New Mexico’s standing as one of the country’s premier destinations for quantum innovation.”

“New Mexico’s quantum sector is booming,” said TIO Director Nora Meyers Sackett. “From the Elevate Quantum Tech Hub to our partnership with DARPA’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative and investing in tomorrow’s quantum leaders, we’re creating the ecosystem companies need to innovate, grow, and choose New Mexico.”

The six companies receiving the New Mexico Quantum Technologies Awards are:

Bandelier Technologies $200,000

Bandelier Technologies is a Santa Fe-based quantum sensing company bridging the gap between breakthrough quantum science and real-world deployment, building quantum hardware systems and the AI models that unlock their operational potential. Working in close partnership with Los Alamos National Laboratory through the NM Lab-Embedded Entrepreneur Program, Bandelier develops sensing and network intelligence platforms for defense, telecommunications, and critical infrastructure applications.

Conductor Quantum $200,000

Conductor Quantum is building AI software that operates and scales quantum computers. Its goal is quantum superintelligence: an AI agent that operates a quantum computer to make discoveries beyond the reach of the most gifted human minds. The company’s flagship product, Coda, is the natural language interface for quantum computing, enabling anyone or any agent to use a quantum computer. Coda is used today by employees at technology companies including NVIDIA and Arm. Based in San Francisco, the company will use this funding to expand operations into New Mexico.

Mesa Photonics $200,000

Mesa Photonics is a Santa Fe-based company developing a squeezed laser source for scientific and research applications. Its goal is to provide an innovative, turnkey system that features a highly refined form factor and an intuitive user interface. This ultrafast, spectrally broad system utilizes advanced optical detectors and closed-loop electronic control to enable seamless integration into early-stage quantum technology development.

Mesa Quantum $200,000

MesaQuantum Systems Inc. is a venture-backed company driving the commercialization of chip-scale quantum clocks and sensors engineered for volume manufacturing. Mesa Quantum develops quantum-optimized VCSELs (Q-VCSEL) that serve as photonic building blocks for next-generation quantum sensing and computing systems. With expertise drawn from Sandia and NIST national laboratories in vapor cell-based devices, Mesa Quantum’s vision is to make quantum clocks and sensors small enough and affordable enough for mass-market applications. Mesa Quantum was awarded the pilot Quantum Technologies Award in 2025 and will use this funding to build on work previously enabled by the state, including expanding its footprint in Albuquerque.

Photon Queue $200,000

Photon Queue Inc. builds quantum memory devices that quantum computers need to scale. The company’s novel free-space architecture stores photons by routing them through compact mirror arrangements, effectively placing the photons on a treadmill that holds them until they are needed. Operating at room temperature with no exotic infrastructure, Photon Queue’s devices deliver industry-leading performance that is accelerating the development of quantum computing. Based in Chicago, the company will use this funding to expand operations into New Mexico.

UbiQD $200,000

UbiQD is a New Mexico-based nanotechnology company that develops and manufactures quantum dots, nanoscale semiconductor materials with applications in agriculture, renewable energy, and advanced quantum photonics. Founded in Los Alamos and built on technology licensed from Los Alamos National Laboratory and MIT, UbiQD is a global leader in quantum dot manufacturing and is constructing a large-scale production facility in New Mexico to support growing demand for its products.

Source: New Mexico Economic Development Department

The post New Mexico Awards $1.2M to Grow State’s Quantum Sector appeared first on HPCwire.

Developed for the German Aerospace Center’s Quantum Computing Initiative (DLR QCI), Carina represents a compact, room-temperature foundation for future fault-tolerant quantum computing in data center environments

ENSCHEDE, Netherlands, July 14, 2026 — QuiX Quantum today announced Carina, the world’s first universal photonic quantum computing architecture designed for deployment in customer data center environments as an essential foundation for future fault-tolerant systems.

Developed as part of the Universal Photonic Quantum Computer (UPQC) project of the DLR Quantum Computing Initiative (DLR QCI), funded by the German Federal Minister of Research, Technology and Space, Carina brings together key building blocks for universal quantum computing using single photons as physical qubits, and integrates the critical technologies required for measurement-based photonic quantum computing into a single stack. The compact, room-temperature system is designed to work seamlessly with classical high-performance computing, AI and data center infrastructure to prepare workflows and staff for upcoming utility-scale devices.

Unlike previous special-purpose photonic systems built around narrow computational models such as boson samplers, Carina is designed to implement a universal gate-set to perform any gate-based quantum algorithm. By combining photon generation, multiplexing, state generation, measurement, photonic assembly control and fast feed-forward control, Carina establishes the physical qubit foundation for the company’s next-generation Dedalo architecture and its path toward logical qubits.

“When Manny Knill, Raymond Laflamme and I published our linear optics quantum computing scheme in 2001, the central question was whether the probabilistic nature of photon-to-photon interactions could be tamed into something computationally universal. The answer was yes in principle — but the engineering path looked formidable,” said Prof. Gerard J. Milburn, University of Queensland. “What QuiX Quantum is showing with Carina and its measurement-based approach is that this path is not only tractable but navigable with integrated photonics. The combination of on-chip single-photon generation, feed-forward control and cluster-state generation in a system designed for deployment outside the laboratory is precisely the kind of milestone the field awaits. It moves the conversation from whether photonic quantum computing can be universal to how quickly it can be scaled.”

“Quantum photonics aims to bring quantum technologies to a broader audience by leveraging the remarkable capabilities of the semiconductor fabrication industry. The launch of Carina from QuiX marks an exciting milestone in this journey: the first system designed both to generate on-chip cluster states, the fundamental resource for measurement-based quantum computing, and for commercial deployment,” said Prof. Andrew G. White, University of Queensland. “To ensure robust and reliable operation, QuiX has integrated photon generation and detection, real-time feedforward, and control electronics into a platform designed for end users rather than exclusively for laboratory research. Congratulations to the whole QuiX team: I can’t wait to see what the next few years bring for photonic quantum computing.”

“Carina marks a major milestone for QuiX and the photonic quantum computing industry towards deploying utility-scale quantum systems at customer sites,” said Dr.-Ing. Stefan Hengesbach, CEO of QuiX Quantum. “The field has been split between systems that could be commercialized quickly but were not built for universal, fault-tolerant computing, and architectures with long-term scalability potential that remained difficult to deploy. Carina is bringing those two requirements together into a universal architecture for installation into real customer environments.”

Many quantum computing platforms still depend on highly specialized operating environments, including extensive cryogenic infrastructure, which can make deployment, maintenance and integration difficult. Carina addresses the practical requirements that quantum systems need to operate where real-world workloads currently run.

The full white paper is available here.

About QuiX Quantum

QuiX Quantum is a European photonic quantum computing company founded in Enschede, the Netherlands, in 2019. The company develops integrated photonic quantum computing hardware and describes its approach as full-stack and fabless, with systems designed for modularity, scalability, and compatibility with data center and HPC environments. QuiX Quantum has offices in the Netherlands and Germany and is developing universal photonic quantum computing systems based on its silicon nitride photonic technology.

Source: QuiX Quantum

The post QuiX Quantum Unveils Universal Photonic Quantum Computing Architecture appeared first on HPCwire.

LONDON and AUSTIN, Texas, July 14, 2026 — The Jane Goodall Institute USA and FormationQ today announced a landmark research partnership that will apply trapped-ions quantum computing by IonQ to one of the most enduring questions in behavioral ecology: why do some species engage in lethal intergroup violence while others live peacefully alongside their neighbors?

Launching on World Chimpanzee Day, which marks the 66th anniversary of Dr. Jane Goodall’s arrival at Gombe, Tanzania to begin her wild chimpanzee study, the two-year program builds on more than six decades of pioneering field research, bringing together advanced computational modeling, hybrid quantum-classical computing and behavioral ecology into a new state-of-the-art collaborative research framework.

The program, Ecology of War and Peace: Using Quantum-Enhanced Agent-Based Modelling to Explain Contrasting Intergroup Behaviour in Chimpanzees and Bonobos, will mark a first-of-its-kind application of quantum-enhanced computation to the study of ecology, evolution and behavior, representing a new chapter in the Jane Goodall Institute USA’s decades-long legacy of using innovative technologies to support long-term research, conservation and education.

The program will bring together JGI’s unparalleled scientific legacy, behavioral modeling developed by researchers at the University of Minnesota, FormationQ’s expertise in designing and operating applied programs and IonQ’s quantum computing platform.

At the center of the program is B3GET (Behaviour, Ecology, Genetics, Evolution and Tradeoffs), a sophisticated agent-based model in which virtual primates live, move, forage, reproduce and interact across artificial landscapes. Researchers can systematically vary ecological conditions including food distribution, home range size and group cohesion rules, to investigate how environmental factors influence patterns of cooperation and conflict over time.

Chimpanzees and bonobos are humanity’s two closest living relatives, yet they display strikingly different patterns of intergroup behavior. Jane Goodall famously observed chimpanzee warfare in the 1970s, in which chimpanzees engaged in organized, lethal inter-group conflict. Bonobos, however, are known to peacefully socialize between communities.

The answer in explaining this difference, researchers believe, lies in ecology: in the way food is distributed across the landscape, the size of the ranges each species must cover, and the moment-to-moment decisions individuals make about whether to travel alone or in groups. Decades of field research have provided extraordinary insights into these behaviors. However, understanding how numerous ecological variables interact across complex systems remains a significant challenge.

By combining advanced agent-based modeling with hybrid quantum-classical computational approaches, the program will investigate how quantum computing can help researchers explore this complex space in new ways and improve the calibration of large-scale behavioral models, thereby helping identify the ecological conditions that distinguish the lethal intergroup aggression of chimpanzees from the more peaceful coexistence of bonobos.

The project will also provide insights into how chimpanzees’ natural behavior connects to habitat and increased mortality. Both factors are essential to not only understand chimpanzees, but also better identify and protect habitats and model chimpanzee populations to develop more effective conservation strategies.

Dr. Lilian Pintea, Vice President of Conservation Science at the Jane Goodall Institute and Principal Investigator, said: “Dr. Jane Goodall spent over 65 years building the most comprehensive ongoing record of wild chimpanzees. That legacy of patient, rigorous observation is now meeting the frontier of quantum science. Understanding the ecological conditions that drive how chimpanzees interact with their habitats and neighbors is also relevant to understanding why populations thrive or decline, and where conservation action will matter most.

“This partnership embodies exactly what the Jane Goodall Institute’s scientific work stands for: strategically bringing the most powerful technology tools available to bear on the questions that matter most for chimpanzees, for conservation, and for our understanding of what it means to be human. This program is one of the last that Jane and I worked on together. Launching it today, on the 66th anniversary of her first day at Gombe, is deeply meaningful to me.”

Nada Hosking, Founder and CEO of FormationQ said: “This program starts with a profound scientific question, decades of extraordinary field research and a sophisticated model built to understand a deeply complex natural system. FormationQ’s role in this partnership is to bring those elements together with IonQ’s frontier quantum computing capabilities and build a research program around a question that has never before been approached in this way.

“We believe the real promise of quantum will emerge when world-leading domain expertise, data and models are connected to the technology in ways that allow researchers to ask new questions. There could be few more meaningful places to begin than with Jane Goodall’s extraordinary scientific legacy and what it can still teach us about nature, conservation and ourselves.”

About the Jane Goodall Institute

The Jane Goodall Institute (JGI) is a global conservation organization founded in 1977 that advances Dr. Jane Goodall’s legacy in 30 offices around the world. The Jane Goodall Institute continues Jane’s vision of inspiring hope and transforming it into action through science driven, technology enabled programs focused on wildlife research and rehabilitation, community-led conservation, and youth engagement. Through the youth program Jane Goodall’s Roots & Shoots, now active in 75 countries around the world and counting, JGI is creating a movement of compassionate people who uphold its mission to create a better world for people, other animals, and our shared environment.

About FormationQ

FormationQ is the enablement layer for global quantum adoption. The company builds the institutional pathways and collaborative structures that allow quantum technologies to move from frontier research into real-world use. Working with leading institutions and technology partners, FormationQ operates and supports programmes that advance talent development, application formation, and ecosystem coordination in ways that can be governed, trusted, and sustained over time.

Source: FormationQ

The post FormationQ Brings Quantum Computing to Chimpanzee Behavior Research appeared first on HPCwire.

PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2; Marimittu Games
A soft puzzle game makes a sharp point about the over-optimised future ahead

In the far future, on a planet that is not Earth, AI is in charge. This entity is no Skynet-esque killer robot but a machine that cares for humanity. Manifesting most visibly as cute droids, the technology is pervasive – embedded in everything from the design of the sleek architecture to the gorgeous, mostly sunny artificial weather. The so-called Optimization System has but one responsibility: ensuring the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people.

In less skilled hands this game might have felt like an undergraduate seminar on the limits of utilitarianism. But Japanese studio Marumittu Games elegantly marries its philosophical concerns with smart design choices. You play as a young, unnamed Facilitator tasked with tending to both the city’s bots and its human residents. Each morning you wake up, sleepily loping off to the bathroom before sitting down for an exquisitely rendered breakfast, and then embark on your day’s work. Like everything else in this near-future scenario, labour is designed to cause as little frustration as possible, amounting to simple maths brain teasers on a grid – nothing too taxing, but enough to keep you engaged.

TORONTO, July 14, 2026 — Xanadu Quantum Technologies Limited, a leading photonic quantum computing company, and Lockheed Martin, a global security and aerospace company, today announced a new strategic effort to scale quantum training and workforce development through Lockheed Martin’s Quantum Talent Pipeline (QTP) program.

As quantum technologies transition from research labs to mission-critical environments, the demand for a quantum-savvy workforce is quickly rising. Building on their previously announced research relationship, most recently highlighted by a joint initiative in Quantum Machine Learning (QML), Xanadu and Lockheed Martin are now turning their attention to a critical bottleneck in quantum adoption: training the engineers who will put these technologies to work.

The QTP is an internal Lockheed Martin initiative that identifies professionals from diverse technical backgrounds, from mechanical engineering to computer science, and equips them with the skills to integrate quantum methods into their R&D work. Through the collaboration, QTP participants are now utilizing Xanadu’s PennyLane quantum programming stack and educational resources – including interactive tutorials, hands-on coding exercises, and structured learning pathways – to develop practical quantum computing skills applicable to aerospace, defense, and advanced engineering.

“To fully leverage the power of quantum computing, we need a workforce that is ready to take advantage of what these machines do best,” said Dr. Christian Weedbrook, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Xanadu. “By integrating PennyLane into their training pipeline, we are helping Lockheed Martin engineers bridge the gap between their existing domain expertise and the unique advantages of quantum technology. Lockheed’s QTP program is a case study for how leading organizations can build quantum readiness from within.”

In addition to providing educational content and software tools, Xanadu’s team is delivering dedicated workshops, offering guided instruction on quantum programming, algorithms, and the application of quantum computing in key research areas. Access to Xanadu’s quantum simulators and other hardware via PennyLane allows QTP participants to move quickly from theory to execution, reinforcing the program’s emphasis on practical skill-building.

“Quantum computing will be central to solving some of the most complex challenges in aerospace and national security,” said Dani Couger, Quantum Technologies Lead for Lockheed Martin. “By providing our engineers with practical quantum skills through Lockheed Martin’s Quantum Talent Pipeline, supported by resources like Xanadu’s PennyLane platform, we are positioning Lockheed Martin to lead in the adoption of next-generation computing technologies.”

As the QTP program scales to additional cohorts across Lockheed Martin’s engineering workforce, the collaboration between the two companies will continue to deepen, with expanded educational content, hands-on workshops, and broader access to Xanadu’s quantum computing tools and expertise. Together, Xanadu and Lockheed Martin are building the foundation of a quantum-ready workforce prepared to tackle the most demanding challenges in aerospace, defense, and beyond.

About Xanadu

Founded in 2016, Xanadu is a Canadian photonic quantum computing company with the mission to build quantum computers that are useful and available to people everywhere. Xanadu is building fault-tolerant quantum computers using light, with systems designed to compute at room temperature. Backed by more than $500 million USD in funding, Xanadu develops both hardware and software, including PennyLane, its open-source quantum computing platform. Xanadu is the first pure-play photonic quantum computing company to list on public markets (Nasdaq/TSX: XNDU) and is recognized globally for its breakthroughs in scalable quantum technologies.

Source: Xanadu

The post Xanadu and Lockheed Martin Expand Quantum Talent Pipeline appeared first on HPCwire.

Beta users can ask questions about Spotify content, including music, podcasts and audiobooks.

PM to declare Australia the first country worldwide to bring economic, social, security and environmental issues from AI under single office in major speech

• Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

Anthony Albanese says the federal government will introduce faster approval processes for AI projects, including datacentres, across Australia, seeking to shore up investor certainty and maintain community confidence in the rapidly advancing technology.

Announcing the creation of a new office of AI to be established within his department in a major speech on Wednesday, the prime minister will declare Australia is set to become the first country in the world to bring the economic, social, national security and environmental issues stemming from AI into a single, national framework.

Aid worker flown to Berlin as Trump administration bars Americans from traveling to US on commercial flights

A US national who contracted Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has arrived in Germany for treatment, the health ministry in Berlin said on Monday, weeks after another American infected with Ebola in the DRC was treated in Berlin.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration on Monday said it was blocking American citizens in ⁠the DRC from traveling to the US on commercial flights, Reuters reported, citing a White House official.

President Trump said the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool was drained for repairs, after weeks of railing against alleged vandals.

• St Louis Cardinal homers on final six swings

• 24-year-old outfielder wins $1m and title

• Schwarber, Contreras finish second and third

Jordan Walker silenced Philadelphia’s boo birds by homering on his last six swings, chasing down Phillies slugger Kyle Schwarber in the final round and becoming the first St Louis Cardinal to win the Home Run Derby on Monday night.

Schwarber hit 11 homers during his 15-swing turn in the final round. Philly fans, who loudly booed everyone but Schwarber and Bryce Harper throughout the night, quietly headed toward the exits when Walker’s winning shot soared over the left-field wall.

‘No unruly behaviour will be tolerated’ after the match, according to France’s interior minister

Here is the first big moment of the day as the Garde républicaine plays the French national anthem, “La Marseillaise”.

Macron is not singing, but Lecornu behind him – very much is.

Bar owner offers ‘deepest apologies’ as police investigate whether exits were either blocked or hard to access

The Bangkok pub that became the scene of the city’s deadliest blaze in 17 years has said it will cooperate with an investigation into alleged negligence, as the death toll rose to 30.

The local district office said on Tuesday that three more people had died after the devastating fire that broke out in the early hours of Monday. An initial assessment by disaster officials found an electrical short ‌circuit in an air conditioner located in the ‌ceiling had caused the fire.

Mourn him if you wish, but let’s be honest about what he promoted. The longer this thinking lives on, the more peril we will all face

The sudden death over the weekend of the South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham is predictably inspiring a slew of tributes to the four-term Republican senator. Donald Trump has already ordered flags be flown at half-staff until Saturday, and Republican politicians across the country are fondly recalling Graham. But so too are the Democrats. Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois honored Graham, calling him “a fierce Republican partisan one day and a key bipartisan ally the next”. Senator Adam Schiff of California lauded Graham’s “sense of humor and how he deployed it to move his policy positions forward”.

Through this thick, bipartisan forest of remembrances, however, lies Graham’s concrete legacy. Death has a way of extinguishing uncomfortable truths, but it’s important that we don’t forget who Graham was, what he exactly stood for, and what damage he has done over his political career.

The U.S. military shared video of what it said was its first use of sea drones in combat, to attack an Iranian submarine and ship maintenance facility.

Ofwat says repeated errors led to ‘real disruption and hardship for residents and businesses across many years’

• Business live – latest updates

South East Water will pay £30.5m after a series of supply interruptions, customer failings and for breaching its licence, the regulator Ofwat has said.

The watchdog said the redress package concluded three investigations into the supplier and included a previously proposed £22m fine for water supply failures between 2020 and 2023 affecting more than 286,000 people.

Energy prices later stabilise after Trump abandons plan for 20% levy on traffic through strait of Hormuz

Oil and gas prices jumped and expectations of interest rate rises in Europe increased on Tuesday after the US carried out a third night of military strikes against Iran.

However, they later eased back after Donald Trump said he would abandon his proposal for the US to levy a 20% fee on cargo passing through the strait of Hormuz.

The name "White-chested Fox" was found in drawings dating from 400 BC to 900 AD at the San Bartolo-Xultun archaeological site.

London Conference 2026: The Alliance after Ankara: Is NATO dead? Video thilton.drupal 14 July 2026

Just the day after the 2026 NATO Summit in Ankara, the first session of Chatham House’s 2026 London Conference addressed the future of alliance.

The panel, hosted by Marion Messmer, the director of the International Security Programme at Chatham House, explored the following questions:

• Can NATO survive without the US?
• Has US pressure on allies to increase defence spending started to yield results?
• How do governments avoid procurement mistakes of the past?
• What war and conflict are governments rearming for? What are the most acute threats?  

Speakers:
General Sir Richard Barrons, Senior Consulting Fellow, International Security Programme, Chatham House
Paul Livingston, Chief Executive UK & NATO, Lockheed Martin
Kajsa Ollongren, Former Defence Minister, Kingdom of the Netherlands; Associate Fellow, Europe Programme, Chatham House
The Rt Hon Lord George Robertson of Port Ellen, Distinguished Fellow, Chatham House; Chair, International Relations and Defence Committee, House of Lords 
Chair: Marion Messmer, Director, International Security Programme, Chatham House 

To learn more about NATO and the key takeaways from the Ankara summit, register for our upcoming event, ‘Perspectives on Ankara: The security and defence implications of the NATO Summit’

Director general Matt Brittin says funding model ties corporation to the past as number of licences falls by 539,000

The number of people paying the BBC’s licence fee has fallen faster than expected in the last year, with half a million more households opting out of the payment.

Matt Brittin, the BBC’s director general, said the broadcaster faced a “moment of real jeopardy”, as the licence fee funding model “ties us to the past”.

Restoring oil tanker traffic in the vital Middle East shipping corridor to prewar levels likely will require a much bigger armada of U.S. warships if not tens of thousands of American troops on Iranian soil, experts say.

Doctors and human rights experts documented hundreds of incidents from June 2025 through May 2026 and estimate true number is ‘far greater’

It’s been a brutal tactic deployed by local and federal law enforcement officials time and again over the past year: using teargas, rubber bullets and pepper spray to control protests outside ICE detention centers or during enforcement operations.

Now, a new report lays bare the scale of the use of these crowd control weapons during anti-immigration demonstrations across the US, including hundreds of incidents that resulted in lasting and traumatic injuries.

Apple TV received 89 Emmy nominations for a reason.

Scientists at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT-M) have created what they describe as the world's most detailed 3D cellular atlas of the human brainstem, linking whole-brain MRI views to individual neurons across more than 500 tissue sections. The free online atlas, called Anchor, could help researchers better understand diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, stroke, and SIDS by showing how healthy and diseased brain tissue differs cell by cell. The BBC reports: Built from high-resolution microscope images rather than costlier molecular techniques, it creates a detailed three-dimensional map of the brainstem, identifying more than 200 clusters of brain cells and nerve pathways. Eight chemical markers help distinguish different cell types, producing one of the clearest pictures yet of this vital, but poorly, understood part of the brain. The brainstem occupies only a sliver of the brain, yet it keeps people alive. It links the brain to the spinal cord and controls breathing, heartbeat, sleep, wakefulness and movement. [...] Users can zoom from the whole brainstem seen on MRI down to individual neurons while maintaining their precise spatial relationships. The researchers have made the atlas freely available online, hoping it becomes a reference tool for neuroscientists, neurologists and neurosurgeons worldwide. Its applications could also extend well beyond anatomy. By comparing healthy brainstem maps with diseased tissue, scientists may better understand disorders ranging from Parkinson's disease and stroke to Alzheimer's disease and sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). More precise maps could also help neurosurgeons navigate one of the brain's most delicate regions with greater confidence.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A government that demands instant obedience while concealing its identity cannot expect trust – or escape responsibility for the consequences

There are videos that do more than document a story. They alter the way we understand it.

Ronaldo Salgado spent 7 July searching for his father. At the scene of a shooting in Houston’s East End, he found his father’s work van behind police tape. Later, he saw a video online: a man had been shot in the street. Ronaldo could not identify him by sight. He recognized Lorenzo Salgado Araujo by his voice, crying for help.

Rebecca Slaughter, fired by Trump from the FTC in 2025, worries agencies will fear defying the US president

Federal officials fired by the Trump administration are calling a recent supreme court decision a “dagger” at the heart of the civil service that will open independent federal government agencies to corruption and manipulation at the whim of the president.

Since Donald Trump took office again in January 2025, he fired more than 50 officials from federal agencies as his administration openly sought to have the supreme court overturn a landmark 1935 ruling that limited the president’s power over independent agencies, known as Humphrey’s Executor.

Country risks new tariffs from US and EU as it looks likely to match or beat last year’s record surplus of $1tn

• Business live – latest updates

China’s monthly car ‌exports topped 1m for the first time in June as overall overseas shipments from the world’s second biggest economy rose 27%.

Official Chinese customs data showed that a stronger-than-expected trade performance kept China on track to match or beat last year’s record trade surplus of $1tn (£748bn), achieved despite Donald Trump’s curtailed tariff war.

AT&T shook up its wireless phone plans in 2026. We choose the best options.

The two climbers had not made contact since leaving a mountain refuge on July 9, according to authorities.

Change of US position on free navigation comes as two tankers hit by Iranian cruise missiles. Plus, the international outpouring of love for the late actor Sam Neill

Good morning. The US has launched its third consecutive night of strikes on Iran, hours after Donald Trump said Washington would reinstate a maritime blockade on the country and charge ships for safe passage. The UAE said two ⁠national tankers ⁠were ​targeted by two Iranian cruise missiles in ⁠the southern lane of the strait ⁠of Hormuz in Omani territorial ​waters, ‌killing one ‌Indian crew member and wounding ‌eight others, including four seriously.

Iran and the US are in theory nearly halfway through the 60-day period of an interim deal that was supposed to set up talks for a permanent end to the war, which began in February with the assassination of Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei. In reality, that deal has devolved into a series of attacks over the strait of Hormuz, resulting in the near-total collapse of an interim ceasefire and worrying world leaders that the conflict could fully resume.

How has Trump changed his position on tolls? On Monday, Trump said the US would demand a 20% tariff on all cargoes shipped through the strait of Hormuz. Until now, the US had said the strait should remain open to all without tolls – as it was before Washington and Israel attacked Iran on 28 February. Any attempt by the US or Iran – which has also proposed tolls – to charge fees would violate global norms on freedom of navigation and would be likely to cause further economic disruption far beyond the region.

What did Nordone say about her appointment? In brief remarks, Nordone, 64, said: “Lindsey has always been there for me, and now I will be there for him. I promise to work hard over the next several months to support the president and carry forward the efforts of my brother on behalf of the citizens of South Carolina and the United States. I think this is what Lindsey would have wanted, and I plan to honor him in this way. I miss you more than I can even put into words, but I’m going to do this. I got it.”

What I’m Discussing Today

• Kareem’s Quote of the Day: What happens when we mistake a prediction for a guarantee and stop doing the hard work?

• Trump Promises Destruction of Iran if He’s Assassinated: A late-night revenge fantasy is especially dangerous when it treats 93 million lives as props.

• The White House Orders the FBI to Investigate The New York Times: Reporters as collateral damage anytime the government calls its own embarrassment a national-security concern.

• Caitlin Clark’s Congressional Fan Club Should Find Better Things To Do: Congress should worry less about manufacturing outrage over one hard foul and more about the racist abuse aimed at WNBA players after the game.

• The Piano Lesson | Malcolm Washington (2024) - Netflix: August Wilson’s family drama becomes a powerful motion picture, thanks to Denzel Washington and his two sons.

• Bill Withers, Stevie Wonder and John Legend | “Lean on Me” (2015): Stevie Wonder and John Legend bring so much soul to this performance at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame that its creator, Bill Withers, can’t help but join in.

  ---

Kareem’s Daily Quote

“If you can look into the seeds of time and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak then to me.”

William Shakespeare (1564-1616), Macbeth

If there’s one thing you learn as a professional athlete, it’s that there’s no such thing as a sure thing. I came out of UCLA with three national championships, three college Player of the Year awards, and an 88-2 won-lost record. My first year in the NBA, the Bucks won 56 games after winning only 27 the year before. The next year we won the NBA championship, and I won my first MVP award. The press said it was only a matter of time before I eclipsed Bill Russell’s record of eleven NBA titles. But it took me nine years and a change of teams—to the Lakers—before I won another title, and in that time I learned a lot about the nature of certainty as an NBA player. Namely, that it doesn’t exist. All you can do is put in the hard work and long hours and hope for the best: stay healthy, have a good team around you, a good coach, and a whole lot of luck. There are hundreds of other guys hoping for the same things. I ended up playing 20 seasons in the NBA, and I won six titles and six MVP awards. That means there were 14 seasons my team didn’t win the title and 14 seasons I didn’t win the MVP award. I was the most successful player in the league, but I was hardly a sure bet.

In the world outside the NBA, success is even harder to predict. That’s what Banquo is getting at in that quote from Macbeth. As it turns out, the three witches who have just told his friend Macbeth he’s on his way to the throne of Scotland can see the future. Because they’re witches. But that doesn’t mean Macbeth can. All the things he sees for himself on that throne—most of all, a long life of plenty—are not going to come his way. He doesn’t put in the long hours and the hard work; he takes shortcuts because he thinks his success is guaranteed. The witches told him that he can’t be killed by any “man of woman born,” so he thinks he’s invincible. He ends up with a crazy, suicidal wife and a final offstage battle with Macduff, a man born by Caesarean section—thus, in the terms of the day, not “of woman born”—and guess what happens? If you guessed Macduff reenters with Macbeth’s severed head, you are correct. So much for a long and happy life.

So what drives someone to claim they can identify “which grain will grow”? I’d call it a need for control pretending to be wisdom and expertise. Admitting “I have no idea how this will end” is uncomfortable, especially for people whose job title implies they should know. In the NBA, that’s scouts, analysts, and coaches. In the real world, it’s politicians, prognosticators, and pundits. But what do any of us really know?

Donald Trump came into office in 2016 saying he would build a wall along the border with Mexico that would stretch from coast to coast, and that Mexico would pay for it. A decade later, the wall is half built and Mexico hasn’t paid a cent. He came into office in 2024 saying he would end the war between Russia and Ukraine on his first day back in office. That war is still happening, and no one should be surprised if it’s still going on when he leaves office in 2029. If he leaves office in 2029. I think he will. But I don’t know for sure, and neither do you. If, like me, you want to see the last of him, you should start putting in the hard hours now. That means working to elect a new Congress in the midterms that will check his worst impulses. That means finding a candidate in 2028 who can win back the White House with a mandate to get the country off the dangerous track we’re on today.

Macbeth’s downfall came from his belief that his success was guaranteed and he didn’t have to do the hard work to achieve the future he wanted. That choice was far more damning than the witches’ prophecy. The real tragedy lies in his attempt to bend that prediction to his own will. That’s the deeper lesson buried in this whole exchange: acting rashly on a prediction mistaken for certainty is what actually ends careers, companies, and in Macbeth’s case, kingdoms. We can plant our gardens carefully and tend them with patience. But none of us can predict, with any certainty, what the harvest will be.

Read more

As the Home Run Derby and All-Star Game take over Philadelphia, we take a spin around the majors with an awards watch, an Ohtani update and lots in between

With more than half of the MLB season in the books, the baseball world has convened in Philadelphia for the annual All-Star festivities. What better time for owners and players to engage in Brotherly Love and figure out how to avoid the widely predicted 2027 labor strife that could cancel next season? Considering the storm clouds gathering, a near-term resolution seems unlikely, so we’d better soak in the season we’re having. How’s that going? Glad you asked.

Federal agents showed up at reporters’ homes, targeting journalists for doing exactly what the first amendment protects

To non-journalists, receiving a government subpoena is a serious thing but probably not a violation of basic rights.

To journalists, it’s quite a different matter – an attack on a foundational right to gather information in the public interest and to provide confidentiality to sources.

Memoir details upbringing of late senator – who denied existence of systemic racism – in segregated south

A little-known autobiography from Lindsey Graham published in 2015 sheds light on his complicated record of acknowledging and addressing racism in South Carolina.

Graham, born in 1955, came of age in a small textile town in the segregated south, located in Pickens county, the site of the last documented lynching in South Carolina in 1947. My Story, which came across as political spin to anyone who knew the background of Graham’s unlikely rise to political prominence, is a window into the conservative white man’s view of the south’s enduring racial tensions.

Trump’s former personal attorney has a vast slate of conflicts of interest. Will lawmakers do their job in his confirmation hearings?

Todd Blanche is the most conflicted nominee for attorney general the US Congress has yet to encounter. As the former private attorney for Donald Trump, Blanche has been an unflappable ally for the president since 2023, when he left his private firm, Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, to represent Trump in the hush-money prosecution brought against him by the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg. He went on to represent Trump in two other criminal prosecutions – the Mar-a-Lago classified documents prosecution, and the January 6 prosecution, both brought against Trump by the special counsel Jack Smith.

As both deputy attorney general and as acting head of the justice department since April, when Pam Bondi was fired as attorney general by Donald Trump, Blanche has unabashedly continued his advocacy work for his former client through other means. He has signed off on a settlement between the IRS and Donald Trump regarding the latter’s taxes, that would ban the IRS from pursuing litigation against Trump, his family or his businesses forever. That settlement has now been ruled by a federal judge to be self-dealing; she referred the case to the Florida Bar Association. The New York Bar has issued a letter saying that Blanche is unfit for office.

Claire Finkelstein is the Algernon Biddle professor of law and professor of philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania and the faculty director of its Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law

Every dorm room deserves an upgrade with these capable, space-saving smart products I've reviewed for back-to-school plans.

A combination of fact and fiction leaves the celebrated documentarian’s puzzling project about software training wanting for depth

Marc Isaacs’ new film is a curious, intriguing, semi-sincere affair that I couldn’t make friends with. It is an odd, shallow piece of work about artificial intelligence that is itself exasperatingly artificial, a self-aware docudrama hybrid. Isaacs is, or rather pretends to be, licensing the vivid characters from his previous, acclaimed documentaries to a fictional AI research lab called Synthetic Sincerity at the fictional University of Southern England, so that the lab’s software can be “trained” in the creation of AI human figures on screen.

The lab’s research staff are played by actors, or at any rate people acting; these include Lebanese independent film-maker Lynn El Safah. Isaacs has amusing scripted conversations about this project with a disapproving AI avatar on screen, like Max Headroom of old, whose face is digitally modelled on Romanian actor Ilinca Manolache, from Radu Jude’s Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World. The film, however, does not show the process by which Manolache was approached and her face transformed into an AI figure.

Why Should Delaware Care?
Housing costs are rising in Delaware, leading to strained budgets, longer commutes and an increase in the homeless population. This year, lawmakers tried to address this issue – which has become among the biggest facing people’s pocketbooks – by mandating local zoning reforms and easing road upgrade rules. 

Lawmakers took steps this past legislative session to address the state’s shortage of affordable housing, despite pushback from localities. 

One controversial bill would encourage the construction of smaller, more dense housing as well as mandate that local governments choose from a menu of actions to lower costs. Those include reducing parking requirements in areas with bus service, and expediting approvals for income-restricted apartments and other affordable homes. 

Another bill would speed up approvals for dense housing developments by removing a requirement that developers conduct traffic studies for certain projects. Instead, developers would pay a general traffic impact fee. 

A third piece of legislation establishes a process for addressing consumer complaints about home improvement fraud. 

There is a general consensus among lawmakers and advocacy groups that building more houses and maintaining existing ones could push prices down. A 2023 study conducted by the Delaware State Housing Authority reported that Delaware is short almost 20,000 rental units for households that earn less than half the region’s median income.

That study also showed that half of renters in the state are defined as “cost-burdened,” meaning they pay more than what they can reasonably afford for housing. 

While legislators sought to encourage new housing, they notably did not pass legislation to prevent Delaware police from arresting or fining homeless people for sleeping in tents or parked cars – or otherwise lingering in public places. 

Gov. Matt Meyer’s office quietly pushed back against the bill before it came up for debate, citing “property rights concerns,” the potential for lawsuits against cities, and the possibility of jeopardizing federal housing dollars. 

Common-sense reforms or seizing local control?

The most controversial and consequential housing bill the legislature passed was Senate Bill 23, dubbed “The Housing for Every Delawarean Act,” which would require most localities to increase housing density and adopt other measures to make homes more affordable. 

Sponsored by Sen. Russ Huxtable (D-Lewes), Senate Bill 23 primarily reforms state requirements for comprehensive plans — which are roadmaps for future growth the state requires counties and municipalities to update every 10 years. 

Comprehensive plans can have enormous impacts on what is and isn’t allowed to be built because it guides zoning changes, transportation investments and natural resource protection. 

Under the bill, counties, cities and towns with a population more than 2,000 residents would have to add an affordable housing plan to their comprehensive plans. 

“This bill helps ensure those plans lead to action,” said Rep. Kendra Johnson (D-Bear), the bill’s cosponsor.

That affordable housing plan would have to increase the maximum density of residential areas and remove barriers to constructing smaller houses, such as townhomes and duplexes. 

Senate Bill 23 lists nearly a dozen other measures meant to make housing more affordable or easier to find. Local governments would have to choose at least five of them to include in their plan. 

Those measures include waiving impact fees for income-restricted housing, allowing more transitional housing and speeding up the approval process for affordable homes. 

The stated goal of the bill is to make 20% of a municipality or county’s housing affordable. Delaware’s State Housing Authority would release annual reports on the progress toward that goal. 

Many local government officials opposed Senate Bill 23 because they saw it as part of an erosion of local control, a long-running point of tension between local governments and the Delaware legislature. 

But Meyer indicated that he supports the bill, meaning it will most likely go into law in the coming weeks. 

Fewer traffic studies, more impact fees

The legislature also passed House Bill 450 last month, which is designed to expand on Meyer’s recently-created permit accelerator for affordable housing and other priority projects. 

The bill would raise the bar for when the state Department of Transportation, counties and municipalities could require traffic impact studies.

The new threshold for whether the study would be required is an additional 500 car trips during peak travel hours. 

Currently, whether a traffic study is required is based on how many car trips a development would generate throughout the entire day.

The bill also requires DelDOT to establish and collect transportation impact fees that would fund off-site road improvements and other transportation infrastructure upgrades. The revenue from those fees would have to be spent in the same county they were collected. 

It also establishes a 2% surcharge on that fee that would go toward open space and farmland preservation, as well as coastal restoration. 

Meyer has not said whether he supports the bill. 

Home contractor complaints

Finally, both chambers of the legislature unanimously passed House Bill 89, which establishes a mandatory mediation process when consumers complain to the Delaware Department of Justice Consumer Protection Unit about home contractors. 

The bill’s prime sponsor, Rep. Eric Morrison (D-Glasgow), said some home contractors in Delaware take advantage of the elderly, individuals with disabilities and other underserved communities. 

Morrison said the customer protection unit currently does not have the capacity or a formal process to address home improvement fraud complaints. 

The bill would establish a process to address these complaints and allow the state DOJ to hire a lawyer and two staff members to implement that process. 

Last year, Spotlight Delaware highlighted the difficulty that prosecutors often have in trying such cases, which influenced the alternative resolution process ultimately proposed in Morrison’s bill.

Meyer has not said whether he supports this bill, either.

The post Delaware General Assembly roundup: Housing reforms  appeared first on Spotlight Delaware.

Why Should Delaware Care?
Delaware typically funds private construction through two pots of money — the Bond Bill and the grant-in-aid fund. But a lesser-known pot of money is allocating $20 million between 130 nonprofit organizations throughout the state. 

Delaware’s grant-in-aid bill is not the only way the state financially supports the nonprofit sector. A second, lesser-known pot of money, called the Community Reinvestment Fund, also is sending dollars to those private organizations. 

Last month, lawmakers approved $20 million for the Community Reinvestment Fund as part of the state’s capital budget legislation, known as the Bond Bill. While text of the bill did not reveal the individual awards from the fund, Spotlight Delaware has since obtained a list of those awardees.

It shows the dollars funding about 130 private organizations or entities of local governments across the state. 

Those recipients include town revitalization projects, services for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities, and youth groups providing after-school activities.

The awards from the fund are determined “through the input of all members of the General Assembly,” Deputy Controller General Robert Scoglietti said in a statement to Spotlight Delaware.  

As a part of the annual bond bill, the state government issues debt through the bond market that is purchased by institutional investors. That debt is then repaid with interest with taxpayer funds over a longer term.

Asked why the fund is necessary when the state already has a $100 million grant-in-aid program, Scoglietti said the Community Reinvestment Fund is designed for capital improvements while grant-in-aid “provides operational and programmatic grants to nonprofit community organizations, fire companies, and some local governments.”

The state’s bond bill also distributed dollars directly to a handful of nonprofits, separate from the Community Reinvestment Fund.

Biggest among those was a $1 million appropriation for renovations at The Queen, a Wilmington music venue owned by a nonprofit.

A roof for Easterseals

One of the largest award winners from the Community Reinvestment Fund was Easterseals Delaware and Maryland’s Eastern Shore, which provides services to individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities. 

Easterseals Delaware and Maryland’s Eastern Shore received more than $625,000, with the money funding facility improvements at three locations. 

Pamela Reuther, chief operating officer of Easterseals, called the Community Reinvestment Fund a “godsend” for nonprofit organizations. 

Organizations like Easterseals that provide services for children and adults with disabilities typically receive reimbursements for those services, and those funds go toward staff salaries and benefits, Reuther said. 

But “when you’re talking about having to come up with $300,000 to fix a roof, it’s not something that typically a nonprofit will have available,” Reuther said. 

Easterseals programs come with strict regulations that mandate temperature controls in facility, Reuther added, meaning it could have to suspend services if its HVAC systems fail. 

Long-delayed repairs covered

The Community Reinvestment Fund will allow some organizations to put dollars toward and complete major renovation projects for the first time in decades. 

Kent-Sussex Industries provides work training, education, and supportive services to adults with disabilities in both Kent and Sussex County. 

Although Kent-Sussex Industries has owned its building in Milford since 1985, CEO Heath Chasanov said it has not had a major upgrade for roughly 35 years. 

The organization received $465,000 through the Community Reinvestment Fund for its own capital projects, which Chasanov said will go toward replacing the roof and interior work. 

Chasanov hopes the money will ensure their facility is useful and safe, and potentially allow the organization to serve more individuals with disabilities. 

Community Reinvestment Fund awardees do go through an application process. Chasanov said his organization has built trust with legislators that they will use the money appropriately. 

“For me, we’re extremely grateful for the state legislature and the budget office for continuing to fund this program,” Chasanov said.

The post Beyond grant-in-aid, Delaware has another fund for nonprofits appeared first on Spotlight Delaware.

Plane bringing Houthi delegation home from Tehran had to divert after Yemeni government bombed Sana’a airport

• Middle East crisis live – latest updates

Iranian flights to and from Yemen are an unacceptable violation of the country’s sovereignty, the vice-president in Yemen’s Saudi-backed, UN-recognised government has said.

Abdullah al-Alimi said in an interview that the planes contained equipment for the Houthi movement, which he said had transformed from merely a domestic threat into a regional and international threat to global security and the global economy.

Canada in a new economic era: Minister of Industry Mélanie Joly on Canada’s industrial strategy and middle-power diplomacy 22 July 2026 — 10:00 TO 11:00 BST Anonymous (not verified) 14 July 2026 Chatham House and Online

Join this fascinating discussion of Ottawa’s efforts to develop its industrial strategy and build middle power economic partnerships at a time of strategic constraint.

Join this fascinating discussion of Ottawa’s efforts to develop its industrial strategy and build middle power economic partnerships at a time of strategic constraint.

As governments place greater emphasis on economic resilience and strategic autonomy, Canada is pursuing a more active industrial policy while strengthening partnerships with trusted allies and fellow middle powers, including the UK. At this event, Mélanie Joly discusses the opportunities and challenges of this approach, examining how governments can advance industrial ambitions while navigating trade commitments, supply chain pressures, and a competitive global economy.

This event discusses:

• What are Canada’s priorities for industrial policy and economic resilience?
• What obstacles could limit Canada’s industrial ambitions?
• Which middle-power partnerships are most important to Canada’s strategy?
• How does the Canada–UK relationship support economic and industrial cooperation?
• What does the future of industrial policy look like for middle powers?

This event will be held under the Chatham House Rule.

Threat of social unrest rises as public indignation at lack of disaster aid comes on top of fallout from US military intervention

• A revolution in ruins: fury amid the rubble of a housing project in quake-hit Venezuela

Public anger at what many perceive as the Venezuelan government’s botched response to twin earthquakes that killed nearly 4,500 people is growing, with one grieving mother caught on camera berating the son of former president Nicolás Maduro.

Maduro’s politician son received a hostile reception while visiting a semi-destroyed social housing project named after his father’s late mentor Hugo Chávez.

With the federal Medicaid work requirement looming in January, Democrats are considering state legislation to call out big companies that employ workers enrolled in the safety net health program.

There’s one indisputable fact about the events of the night of May 8, 1981: Alice Sebold, who had earlier that day just completed her freshman year at Syracuse University, was brutally raped while walking home through a park.

Anthony Broadwater was arrested several months later and subsequently convicted of the assault. He’d spend 16 years in prison, repeatedly being denied parole because he refused to admit guilt. Upon his release in 1998, he was required to register as a sex offender.

Read More

“That Guy Is Still Out There”

Sebold would go on to write and speak about the attack, culminating in the publication of “Lucky,” a memoir about the rape. The book would become a bestseller after the success of Sebold’s first novel, “The Lovely Bones.”

But 40 years after the assault, a court vacated Broadwater’s conviction after the Syracuse district attorney joined a motion to clear him and said in court that Broadwater should never have been prosecuted. While the exoneration made headlines around the world, we wondered how many other victims in Syracuse had been left behind and what else the police might have missed.

What we discovered: No part of the system in Syracuse at the time could be depended on. Police brushed off rapes. Prosecutors bungled confessions or were defeated at trial. Judges overlooked irregularities. And Syracuse University seemed more interested in suppressing news of a rape epidemic than solving it.

Here are some of the key findings from our yearslong investigation into what went wrong after that night in May 1981. You can read the full story of how ProPublica reporter Joaquin Sapien reinvestigated the notorious case — and rapes surrounding it — decades after the fact here.

As Rape Cases Piled Up in Syracuse, Police Failed to Investigate

At the time of Sebold’s rape in the spring of 1981, Syracuse was experiencing a rash of sexual assaults. Hers was the third such attack in the city’s Thornden Park in about seven months. A fourth had occurred a block away. Like the police report in Sebold’s assault, those cases had also been quickly consigned to the inactive file.

Beyond the park, women in Syracuse were being sexually assaulted in their dorm rooms and homes. A nursing student was later attacked at the same spot as Sebold, on the same day that her roommate was raped in their shared apartment. A freshman was raped in a sorority house by a man who broke in through a window. The descriptions of the perpetrators, many of whom carried a knife, were often eerily similar; several were roughly the same height, weight and race.

And yet there were no apparent signs of urgency from law enforcement.

Syracuse University Quashed Media Coverage of Rape and Other Crimes

In addition to Syracuse police appearing to deprioritize rape cases in the early 1980s — a time when few survivors reported their assaults — documents and testimony indicate that the city’s namesake university actively quashed media coverage of these attacks.

If a police report was labeled “NO PRESS,” a former detective in the Sebold case explained in a 2025 deposition, it meant that the university “put their foot down and said no press for any kind of rape, robbery, burglary that’s anywhere in the area of Syracuse University.” He testified that seeing this designation on police reports at the time was not unusual.

A spokesperson for Syracuse University said in an email that “we are not in a position to speak to the actions or decisions of prior administrations,” but the university is now equipped with “comprehensive policies, a steadfast commitment to preventing sexual and relationship violence and robust support structures to help every survivor that comes forward.”

Police and Prosecutors Botched the Lineup and Rushed the Case to Indictment

It was not police work or media coverage that led authorities to Broadwater. His arrest only occurred after Sebold saw him on the street months after the assault and believed he was her rapist. Police arrested the 20-year-old, and he agreed to appear in a lineup.

But at the lineup, Sebold did not identify Broadwater as her attacker. Instead, she selected a man standing to his left.

Police had no other evidence linking Broadwater to the assault aside from a pubic hair sample he had volunteered for comparison to one found on Sebold, which, in a world before DNA testing, could essentially tell investigators only that both Broadwater and the rapist were Black.

The current DA says the case should have ended then and there. “Case is over,” he told ProPublica. “Stop.”

But rather than release Broadwater and continue gathering evidence, an assistant district attorney, Gail Uebelhoer, asked Sebold to draft an affidavit on the spot, explaining what had happened. Sebold wrote in the affidavit that she had picked the man in the No. 5 position because he had been looking at her.

In “Lucky,” her bestselling memoir about the rape, Sebold said Uebelhoer tried to allay concerns about picking the wrong man by claiming that the man she picked and Broadwater were “dead ringers” for each other and implied that the two men coordinated their appearance in the lineup to confuse Sebold. Both men have adamantly denied ever appearing in another lineup together.

Hours after the lineup, Uebelhoer presented the case against Broadwater to a grand jury. In a 2025 deposition, she said she could not remember many of the key details in Sebold’s case but asserted that she had done her job by presenting it to a grand jury without hiding its flaws.

Broadwater’s Decision to Forgo a Jury Trial Backfired

When his case moved forward, Broadwater and his lawyer hoped he’d be better off by opting for a bench trial, in which a judge, not a jury, would decide his fate.

But the judge seemed to have a soft spot for Sebold. In her memoir, she recalls how the judge spoke privately to her during a break in the proceedings, expressing concern about how she was holding up and asking about her family. If a juror had asked such questions of a witness, they would likely have been kicked off the jury and a mistrial might’ve been declared.

The judge also allowed Uebelhoer — then visibly pregnant and no longer handling the case — to take the stand as a witness for the prosecution, where she appeared to imply that Broadwater was responsible for Sebold’s botched identification at the lineup.

Immediately after the prosecutor finished his closing argument, the judge found Broadwater guilty without leaving the bench to deliberate.

The Rapes Continued After Broadwater’s Conviction and a Possible Suspect Emerged

Broadwater’s conviction did not end the rash of sexual assaults in Syracuse. Only four months after the trial, a high schooler named Thomas Weakfall admitted raping five women, four of them within a mile of Thornden Park. He told police his spree had begun in late 1981.

While there’s no evidence that Weakfall attacked Sebold, he did match key elements of the description she gave of her rapist: Black, 16 to 18 years of age, about 5’7” and 150 pounds. Weakfall was Black, 16 years old, 5’9” and 140 pounds, according to police reports. Broadwater was 20, stood 5’6” and weighed about 175 pounds.

But the rape case against Weakfall collapsed because his confession was deemed inadmissible. Officers had taken his statement without a defense attorney present, unaware that Weakfall was already represented by an attorney on an unrelated burglary charge. He ultimately pleaded guilty to second-degree burglary, got five years probation and was released.

Weakfall Confesses Again, but Not to the Sebold Rape

Records show police arrested Weakfall for an attempted rape of a woman inside her car in October 1983. He was released from custody for four months, before pleading guilty to a lesser charge of attempted sexual misconduct. He received a sentence of one year.

During those same four months, Sebold’s roommate was raped in their apartment. She was one of five women attacked in the same cluster of blocks over a five-month period, according to contemporary news accounts. Police suspected that one man had committed the crimes.

While police reports in these assaults suggest an older, taller attacker, elements of the crimes — burglarized homes; women raped at knifepoint and beaten; some bound and gagged — matched Weakfall’s methods.

Sebold’s roommate also told police that, after the assault, she tried to get her assailant to leave by yelling out that her roommate was coming home. He replied: “I know her, we had a thing, we had a deal in the past.”

In 1985, after being spotted using a stolen ATM card, Weakfall confessed to additional rapes, saying he’d assaulted at least three women in the previous few months. This time, his confession stuck and he ultimately served 12 years of an 18-year sentence.

While Weakfall did confess to committing rapes that occurred indoors, he has denied assaulting anyone outdoors. In interviews with ProPublica, he admitted “violating” women but also said he did not commit all the assaults he’d confessed to.

Producers Trying to Make a Film About “Lucky” Sparked the Unraveling of Broadwater’s Conviction

In 2013, a movie producer tasked with writing a screenplay based on “Lucky” contacted Paul Clapper, a retired detective who had played a tangential but important role in the Sebold case. According to the producer, he replied, noting that there were a number of questions in the case: Was the right person arrested? Was Sebold a good witness? If DNA testing had been available, would there have been the same outcome? However, the producer said Clapper never elaborated on this list, and ultimately this attempt to film “Lucky” fell by the wayside.

Years later, a second producer endeavored to make a movie of Sebold’s memoir. His concerns about the story were such that he hired a private investigator to dig deeper. The investigator, Dan Myers, met with Clapper and came away with the impression that Clapper believed Broadwater was innocent of the crime and Weakfall was guilty. Myers brought his concerns to a pair of Syracuse lawyers, who filed a motion to vacate Broadwater’s conviction in 2021. More than 40 years after the rape, and after more than two decades of living as a registered sex offender, Broadwater was exonerated.

The Aftermath: “I’ll Never Write Anything Good Enough”

Five years after the court vacated Broadwater’s conviction, Sebold has no doubt he is innocent and told ProPublica she now questions her decision to report her rape to the police: “None of this would have happened.”

Despite his exoneration, Broadwater said the stigma of being a convicted rapist was still hard to shake, even with his record cleared and a multimillion-dollar settlement from New York state. “I’m still embarrassed that I was convicted and sent to prison for rape for 16 and a half years,” he said. The city of Syracuse and county of Onondaga are contesting Broadwater’s claims. He explained that his life “still ain’t normal. Ain’t never gonna be normal. How could it be normal?”

Sebold and Broadwater have discussed through intermediaries the possibility of meeting in person. But their shared reluctance to travel has made plans difficult.

Sebold said she did recently write a letter to Broadwater in which she takes responsibility for her role in his wrongful conviction. The letter describes, she said, “the deep sorrow I hold for what happened.”

“I’ll never write anything good enough,” Sebold said about the three pages that took four years to compose. It is “probably, in my mind, the most important thing I’ll ever write.”

The post What We Uncovered About the Sexual Assault of Alice Sebold and a City’s Buried Rape Crisis appeared first on ProPublica.

Even deep in the woods, you can make filter coffee without fuss. Here's why this simple, foldable brewing design works so well.

Kyiv’s decision to honour second world war fighters who killed about 100,000 Poles has revived simmering tensions

In the aftermath of Russia’s attack on Ukraine in February 2022, Polish-Ukrainian solidarity emerged as one of the most heartwarming subplots of the Kremlin’s brutal war. Millions of Poles, remembering their country’s own tragic history with Russia, mobilised to help Ukrainian refugees with food, shelter and support as they crossed the border in huge numbers to flee the conflict.

Four years later, that outpouring of generosity and solidarity is a distant memory, as the two countries find themselves locked in a bitter dispute over history that has led to angry rhetoric, mutual mud-slinging and a threat from Poland to block Ukraine’s EU accession until it gets its historical house in order.

Astronomers have detected erythrulose, a sugar found in raspberries and self-tanners, in a gas cloud near the center of the Milky Way. While not essential for life itself, the molecule can convert into a form thought to be important for life's origins, adding evidence that key prebiotic ingredients may be widespread across the galaxy. The Associated Press reports: Using two dish-shaped radio telescopes in Spain, researchers collected data from a large gas cloud near the center of the Milky Way. They identified the sugar in gas form by comparing telescope signals to samples in the lab. It's the latest kind of sugar detected in space -- in a region crossed by NASA's twin Voyager, the farthest spacecraft to ever travel from Earth. Scientists have found interesting chemistry in our galaxy, including building blocks for genetic material and parts of the cell. They spotted a cousin to table sugar near the center of the Milky Way about 25 years ago, and black grains from asteroid Bennu retrieved by NASA's Osiris-Rex spacecraft yielded other sugars, including a key DNA ingredient. The latest sugar isn't essential for life, but can easily convert to a form that's thought to be crucial to kick-starting life on Earth. And it's one of the most complex sugars spotted so far, said astrophysicist Erika Hamden with the University of Arizona. The results were published in the journal Nature Astronomy.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Government has been forced to pay back duties to companies that imported goods into the US that were hit by Trump’s tariffs

• China’s monthly car ‌exports top 1m as overall trade soars

• Business live – latest updates

The US government has already paid back tens of billions of dollars in tariffs it collected before the supreme court ruled them illegal, according to budget figures released on Monday.

Tariffs – taxes on imported goods – have been a key part of Donald Trump’s economic plan since he took office again last year.

A deputy U.S. marshal was shot and killed while serving an arrest warrant on a fugitive in Louisiana, authorities say. The suspect is in custody.

Snappy performance, long battery life, great keyboard and excellent new haptic touchpad make the best of Windows 11

Microsoft’s Surface laptop for consumers is back, faster and with longer battery life and a hefty price increase because of the high cost of memory and chips.

The Surface Laptop 8 is a straight replacement for the seventh edition from 2024, which was the first of Microsoft’s new generation of ARM-based, Qualcomm-powered PCs designed to better rival Apple’s MacBook Air and other thin and light machines.

As general election looms, survey shows twice as many men as women support far-right Sweden Democrats

One is led by Sweden’s first female prime minister, Magdalena Andersson, and has promised smaller school-class sizes, more housing and free dental care for young people. The other, led by Jimmie Åkesson, has neo-Nazi roots and has pledged to lower taxes, improve public safety and treat “anti-Swedishness” as a hate crime.

In the run-up to Sweden’s general election in September, the Social Democrats and the Sweden Democrats are placed first and second respectively in the polls, and between them are expected to scoop up more than 50% of the vote.

Private companies are making Beijing look good in the developing world.

A new use for Russia’s old playbook in Ukraine.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist skewered presidents from Johnson to Trump, reaching a vast audience through syndication.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Associated Press: Hundreds of economists say in an open letter that institutions "must act now" to address how artificial intelligence could transform the economy and could put many people out of work. The statement released Monday was signed by top economists, along with computer scientists and some executives at tech companies including Anthropic, Google and OpenAI. "AI may become radically more powerful over the next 10 years," says the letter organized by Stanford University's digital economy lab. "This could drive an unprecedented transformation of our economy, larger than the Industrial Revolution, but unfolding over a vastly shorter time frame. It could bring risks, including large-scale job displacement, as well as opportunities such as major gains in living standards." The letter, which has only four sentences, says leaders must "build the incentives, guardrails, and institutions needed to steer AI in a direction that complements humans and benefits society." The Stanford lab says the letter has so far been signed by more than 200 economists and AI researchers, including 16 winners of a Nobel Prize. "We must be intentional and make collective, democratic choices, rather than letting market forces play out and risking leaving most citizens behind," wrote computer scientist and AI pioneer Yoshua Bengio, who was also among the signatories. He said it "it is highly plausible that AI will drastically transform our economies." Other signatories include Google CEO Eric Schmidt, LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman, and Nobel laureates Joseph Stiglitz, Daron Acemonglu, and Simon Johnson.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

This blog is closed – our live coverage continues here

Bahrain’s military has accused Iran of targeting civilians with its latest attacks on the country, after Tehran said it had struck US military facilities and infrastructure there earlier.

“Iran continues its systematic hostile approach through its heinous attacks with missiles and drones that target civilians in the Kingdom of Bahrain,” the general command of Bahrain’s military said, adding that air defences “intercepted and destroyed a number of Iranian aerial attacks” this morning.

National Science Foundation X-Labs winners choosing to build in Illinois are eligible for State investment, access to IQMP technical infrastructure, advanced prototyping facilities, and dedicated lab and office space

CHICAGO, July 13, 2026 — Governor JB Pritzker and the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO) have announced the X-Labs Fast Fund to encourage U.S. National Science Foundation X-Labs (NSF X-Labs initiative) teams to choose Illinois as the place to pursue technical breakthroughs in the quantum technology sector. The Illinois X-Labs Fast Fund reinforces Illinois’ leadership as the nation’s leading hub for quantum innovation.

“There’s no better place to build quantum technology than right here in Illinois,” said Governor JB Pritzker. “This is more than an immediate capital injection for these entrepreneurial teams. We’re offering operational autonomy along with access to the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park’s unparalleled technical infrastructure and experimental research facilities, cutting-edge labs, innovation hubs, and networks that can help X-Labs awardees innovate, scale and pursue transformational breakthroughs in the sector.”

The X-Labs Fast Fund is a $3 million capital fund to augment federal funding for teams focused on quantum technologies and awarded under the Phase 0 of the federal X-Labs opportunity. Teams pursuing a federal X-Labs award may write their intention to pursue Illinois funding into their application. The State of Illinois has committed approximately $200 million to attract federal funding for quantum and already demonstrated an ability to quickly deploy those funds. If awarded by NSF, teams will be able to apply to DCEO and receive the grant within months.

“The State of Illinois’ $3 million X-Labs Fast Fund will attract new talent to Illinois, giving entrepreneurs the opportunity to take advantage of our world-class facilities and opportunities for growth,” said DCEO Director Kristin Richards. “With each new investment, Illinois is cementing its reputation as the leading hub for quantum innovation.”

In addition to the $3 million X-Labs Fast Fund, Chicago’s leading quantum innovation organizations have put together a package to attract teams applying to X-Labs. The Chicago Quantum Exchange, P33, Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, and mHUB will add $250,000 in funding, immediate access to elite lab space and advanced prototyping facilities, and access to the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park’s (IQMP) technical infrastructure, including cryogenic, test and measurement equipment, and experimental research facilities. With access to Chicago’s state-of-the-art quantum campus and innovation ecosystem, facilities, assets and resources, X-Labs teams will be able to reduce infrastructure costs and maximize the impact of their NSF funding.

“Through our investment in building a quantum technology campus, IQMP is proud to support both foundational quantum research and the applied quantum industry,” said Brian DeMarco, Chief Technology Officer, IQMP. “We are thrilled to join the vibrant Illinois quantum community, offering support to X-Lab participants.”

“Governor Pritzker and our quantum ecosystem partners are bringing something other geographical areas cannot: a full-stack quantum ecosystem already in motion, full of capital, infrastructure, talent, world-leading academic research institutions and our two national research laboratories,” said Brad Henderson, CEO, P33. “With the largest concentration of quantum activity in North America, Illinois is wired for scale. If you’re building in quantum, this is the opportunity to do groundbreaking work faster.”

Illinois is home to four of the 10 National Research Centers funded by the National Quantum Initiative. This includes two U.S. Department of Energy National Quantum Information Science Research Centers led by Argonne National Laboratory and Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, and two NSF Quantum Leap Challenge Institutes that lead cutting edge research in quantum sensing and hybrid quantum architectures and networks, the exact focus areas for the two NSF X-Labs calls. Illinois was the first state to partner with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to create the Illinois-DARPA Quantum Proving Ground to provide additional support for DARPA performers. The IQMP, a 128-acre development currently under construction, will be one of the largest quantum computing sites in the world, providing infrastructure and resources to support the development and commercialization of quantum technologies, hardware, software, and applications.

“Illinois has built the nation’s most formidable quantum ecosystem thanks to strategic investments like the new fund to attract high-growth, high-impact ventures to the state,” said Illinois EDC President and CEO Christy George. “The Illinois X-Labs Fast Fund ensures that the world’s most promising quantum teams have every reason to build in our state.”

Governor Pritzker has made investing in quantum computing a major priority during his administration. In addition to the $500 million investment in IQMP, Illinois previously invested $200 million to support the Chicago Quantum Exchange, the first state to make that large of a commitment to quantum – a move that cemented Illinois’ leadership nationally and attracted federal research dollars. Companies committed to the IQMP include IBM, anchor tenant PsiQuantum, Infleqtion, Pasqal, Diraq, and Quantum Machines.

More from HPCwire: NSF Launches $1.5B X-Labs Initiative with Initial Focus on Quantum Systems and Scientific Instrumentation

Source: Illinois.gov

The post Illinois Launches $3M Fund to Attract NSF X-Labs Quantum Teams appeared first on HPCwire.

This live blog is now closed.

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email

The Democrat’s outgoing senator for Michigan Gary Peters has endorsed member of Congress Haley Stevens to be his successor over Abdul El-Sayed in the state’s neck-and-neck primary race set for 4 August.

“She has demonstrated to me time and time again that she’s a fighter,” Peters told the Detroit News. “We need workhorses in the Senate, and we need someone who can do that job from day one. This is not a place for on-the-job training.”

Trump’s secretary of state claims the global tribunal is interfering with US military and law enforcement operations

Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, launched a campaign to dismantle the international criminal court (ICC) on Monday, claiming the global tribunal was interfering with US military and law enforcement operations at the risk of American sovereignty.

Rubio invoked images of US border patrol agents and elected leaders being “dragged before an international court” and tried by judges from around the world in a lengthy op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal Monday.

Issue must be addressed with ‘even greater rigour’, says government spokesman, after New York Times report on how it has become a spy hub for Vladimir Putin

Japan has said it recognised the need to counter foreign intelligence better after the New York Times reported that Russia had turned the country into a “den of spies” and key source of weapons components.

The newspaper, in an investigation published on Sunday, reported that thanks to “weak espionage laws”, Moscow was using Japan as a key hub for intelligence gathering and procurement of dual-use technology needed for its war in Ukraine.

The Hisense A10 has a removable magnetic color screen on the back that lets you swap between E Ink and color.

A 65-year-old man was thrown 8 feet into the air by a bison that charged at him in Yellowstone National Park, video shows.

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster announced his pick to fill the vacancy left by Sen. Lindsey Graham's death.

For now, a single satellite has been cleared for a test demonstration, but the company making it hopes to eventually launch 50,000 of them into orbit.

President Trump formally notified Congress that "military action" against Iran restarted last week in a letter obtained by CBS News, as a monthslong ceasefire comes to an end.

Surviving members of the beloved Bahamian musical group Da Pond Band are speaking out about their friends who were killed when a small plane crashed in the Bahamas on Friday, killing 10 people.

Maine Sen. Angus King said he told Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin that he wanted a transparent investigation into the shooting in Biddeford.

Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante in Utah will lose ‘close to a million and a half acres each’ and open land to developers and oil industry

Donald Trump has approved a sharp reduction in the size of two national monuments in Utah held sacred by many Native Americans, in the latest move to open US public land to corporate developers and the oil and gas industry.

The two monuments, Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante, will see a reduction of “close to a million and a half acres each”, Trump said during an executive order signing event on Monday, undoing protections established by former presidents.

Arkansas police said they found bags of capsules containing a green powdery substance in Brandon Clarke's car, which he told them was kratom.

Good, an unarmed US citizen and mother, was killed by immigration officer and Pretti was shot by CBP officials

Previously withheld evidence regarding the fatal shootings of Renée Good and Alex Pretti is now in the hands of Minnesota prosecutors, helping the state gain clarity on the deaths that occurred earlier this year during protests against a federal immigration crackdown.

“Through the cooperation of our federal partners, we have obtained hard drives of previously withheld evidence in the killings of Renée Good and Alex Pretti, and the shooting of Julio Sosa-Celis,” the Hennepin county attorney, Mary Moriarty, said in a video statement posted on social media.

Idaho to have ballot measure for reproductive freedom law that would reverse ban on abortions at all pregnancy stages

One of the strictest abortion bans in the country will be on the ballot this November after Idaho’s secretary of state certified a ballot measure on Monday that would reverse the state’s abortion ban that prohibits the procedure at all stages of pregnancy.

The ballot initiative was headed by a volunteer-run group called Idahoans United for Women & Families, which ran a petition drive to get the measure in front of voters this fall. They gathered more than 100,000 signatures, surpassing the required 70,725 to get on the ballot.

Analysis of 12 indicators including asthma, obesity and vaccination finds child health is ‘national embarrassment’

Children in the UK will grow up to be one of the unhealthiest generations in decades, with child health outcomes having declined or stalled completely across all areas, a group of leading paediatricians has said.

Reduced vaccination rates alongside rising hospital admissions for asthma and mental health disorders are all contributing factors to the UK’s record on children’s health, which should be seen as a “national embarrassment”, their analysis has found.

Despite spending increase in June, Barclays says most people still pessimistic about economy

Relentless sunshine and the World Cup coaxed consumers to spend more on beer and online shopping last month, with purse strings expected to remain loose as England fans gear up for Wednesday’s semi-final.

Most people remain pessimistic about the UK economy, according to data from Barclays Bank based on debit and credit card transactions.

Microsoft is overhauling Windows 11 search to prioritize local apps, files, and settings over web results while removing ads, promotions, MSN/Bing clutter, and other distractions. "You've have been asking for search that is faster, more relevant, and easier to use -- whether you're opening an app, finding a file, or changing a setting," Microsoft says in a new blog post. "Because the Windows Search Box is where many people start, we focused first on making results more dependable, easier to scan, and clearer before you click." Windows Central reports: The company is highlighting several key improvements, including clearer results that does a better job at showing why a search result is appearing when a query has been typed, alongside prioritizing local results before reaching out to the web. Search is also getting better at handling things like typos, which should help surface the right results even when the user misspells an app or file. The search home pane will no longer show MSN or Bing content, and promotional content and ads will no longer appear in search results. These upgrades are now rolling out to Windows Insiders in the Experimental Channel, and are expected to roll out to all Windows 11 users later this year. Insiders may not see the changes right away as they are rolling out in waves. The full list of changes can be found here.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Killing of man – identified by rights groups as 26-year-old Colombian – comes days after man killed by ICE in Texas

• US politics live – latest updates

A federal immigration officer shot and killed a man in Biddeford, Maine on Monday, the Department of Homeland Security confirmed, just days ⁠after a man ⁠was ​killed by an immigration officer during a traffic stop in Texas.

In the statement, DHS claimed Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers were “conducting targeted surveillance on the last known address of an illegal alien with a final order of removal”.

Prime minister-in-waiting votes for plans to tighten appeals system as 14 Labour MPs oppose measures

Andy Burnham has backed the government’s controversial asylum changes, voting for legislation that has divided Labour MPs over plans to tighten the immigration system and reshape the appeals process.

The prime minister-in-waiting and Labour MP for Makerfield supported the immigration and asylum bill at its second reading in the House of Commons on Monday evening, despite a rebellion by 14 Labour MPs.

American president says ships will be charged for safe passage through strait in apparent policy reversal

• Middle East crisis live – latest updates

The US has launched its third consecutive night of strikes on Iran hours after Donald Trump said Washington would reinstate a maritime blockade on the country and, in an apparent policy reversal, charge ships for safe passage.

“These strikes will continue imposing a heavy cost on Iranian forces and degrade their ability to attack innocent civilians and commercial shipping in the strait of Hormuz,” the US military’s Central Command said.

If you're on a grandfathered plan, it will soon be automatically forced onto a newer plan that could cost more.

Claudia Sheinbaum says Mexicans ‘outraged’ over killing last week of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo by agents in Houston

Claudia Sheinbaum announced on Monday that Mexico would be demanding criminal complaints in the US for the deaths of more than a dozen Mexican migrants in immigration detention and those killed in anti-migrant operations.

The deaths include last week’s killing of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston, whom Sheinbaum said was “practically murdered”.

The update also expands Gemini-powered voice search and reporting -- though a new motorcycle mode skips the US for now.

CISA and allied governments are warning users to secure their routers as Russian state-backed hackers continue compromising the devices and turning them into proxy nodes to disguise attacks against critical infrastructure. The advisory urges users to disable outdated SNMP versions, use strong passwords, update firmware, and turn off unnecessary router services to reduce the risk of being swept into these botnets. Ars Technica reports: "Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) Center 16 cyber actors continue to exploit poorly configured and vulnerable networking devices worldwide, opportunistically compromising multiple critical infrastructure sector networks," the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said Monday. The hacking groups are tracked under various names, including Berserk Bear, Energetic Bear, Crouching Yeti, Dragonfly, Ghost Blizzard, and Static Tundra. The advisory was co-issued by governments from around the world, including Australia, Denmark, New Zealand, and the UK. The primary means of compromise the agency warned about was hackers scanning IP ranges with active Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) agents that accept common or default authentication credentials. These scans are run by the very sorts of router botnets the actors are trying to enroll the targeted device in. By sending malicious traffic from spoofed addresses, the hackers can use the SNMP agent on poorly configured routers to run malware. SNMP allows users to collect and organize information about managed networking devices or to modify that information to change device behavior. With control of a device, the hackers then use it as an exit node when probing or attacking targets in the communications, defense, energy, financial services, and government sectors. By funneling the malicious traffic through a benign-appearing device on a trustworthy IP address, the attackers are able to lower the chances of getting blocked by firewalls and other security defenses. Monday's advisory made no mention of identical operations carried out in recent years by China. So-called residential proxies are also a go-to tool used by financially motivated criminal hackers to obscure their true IP address. In many cases, these sorts of proxies are made up of millions of streaming devices that are sold with preloaded malware.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Lindsey Graham's aorta tore at 71. Grant Wahl's burst at 49. One is common and age-driven; the other is inherited, silent, and findable.

Q: Does Barack Obama still owe contractors or subcontractors money for work done on his presidential library in Chicago?

A: Some subcontractors have said they were not paid for their work. The Obama Foundation told us that the construction project manager (Lakeside Alliance) has the “primary responsibility” to “hire and manage all the subcontractors for the project.” The foundation said it has “no outstanding disputed charges” with Lakeside Alliance nor “direct legal agreements or contracts” with subcontractors.

FULL ANSWER

The Obama Presidential Center is a 19.3-acre campus that was built to honor and preserve the legacy of former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama. It is located in Jackson Park in Chicago. The presidential center includes a museum, community athletics and events space, and a branch of the Chicago Public Library. The center opened this year on June 19 — the Juneteenth holiday.

The total estimated cost for the project was $850 million, a spokesperson for the Obama Foundation confirmed with us. That’s hundreds of millions more than a widely reported early estimate of $500 million in 2016, Obama’s last year in office, and $300 million to $350 million, which the Obama Foundation cited in 2018 as the construction cost when the project was getting started.

Several readers have asked us about reports that subcontractors who worked on the project are still owed money and whether the former president is at fault. “Did Obama stiff 2 contractors on the work they did on the library?” one reader asked. Another inquired: “Are the Obamas in debt to minority contractors?”

A week before the opening of the Obama Presidential Center, Crain’s Chicago Business first reported that several subcontractors on the job said they haven’t been paid. The article contained information from mostly anonymous contractors. “The companies, including several established minority-led firms, allege a portion of the unforeseen costs on a project that came in hundreds of millions of dollars over its original estimated budget has been pushed onto them and other small contractors least able to afford them — jeopardizing jobs and the future of some businesses the historic project was designed to elevate,” Crain’s reported.

“Multiple contractors that spoke to Crain’s on condition of anonymity due to confidentiality agreements described a highly complex and delay-riddled construction process with drastic changes to the scope of work and little clarity about who held the final say on key aspects of the project,” the story said.

Crain’s, and subsequently other news outlets that reported on this, quoted Omar Shareef, the president of the African American Contractors Association in Chicago, who said that seven subcontractors had reached out to him in recent months for help getting paid.

Before construction started, the Obama Foundation had made a commitment to prioritizing minority-owned firms, saying that at least 50% of subcontracts would go to “diverse firms,” including those owned by minorities and women.

Later in June, the Chicago Crusader published a story saying that Shareef put the number of Black subcontractors who had contacted him at “about eight” and said they had submitted invoices, then months past due, to Turner Construction totaling about $100 million. Turner Construction is part of Lakeside Alliance, a joint venture of five construction firms and the builder of the Obama Presidential Center.

Shareef confirmed those details to us in a phone interview. He said the $100 million total included a $40 million claim in a lawsuit filed last year against the structural engineer on the project (more on that later). He said the number of subcontractors who had contacted him was now 10, including two white-owned companies.

Shareef said the situation was “very unfortunate because these people looked forward to working on the Obama center,” adding that they were “proud” to work on the presidential museum for the only African American U.S. president. He said the outstanding invoices had been “a disaster” for a lot of the companies, who had mortgages or loan payments due.

Crain’s noted that there were about 475 subcontractors in total on the project. It quoted the operations manager of a ventilation duct contractor, Ryan Cowdrey, as saying that company hadn’t had a problem getting payment. “We’re on track to close out as we should for a project of this magnitude,” he told Crain’s.

The Obama Foundation sent us a statement saying that Lakeside Alliance, as the construction manager, had “primary responsibility … to hire and manage all the subcontractors for the project. Lakeside oversaw the bidding process, including reviewing bids for an understanding of the scope of work and related costs.”

The foundation said it had “no outstanding disputed charges with Lakeside” and “no direct legal agreements or contracts with Lakeside’s subcontractors.”

“We chose Lakeside Alliance as an experienced construction manager that was also committed to going above and beyond to help prepare its subcontractors to handle this project and mentor smaller firms who had never worked on a project of this scale,” the statement said. It also said that Lakeside had “identified subcontractors who needed financial assistance” at the foundation’s request and that the foundation “has worked with Lakeside to find a path forward, often involving accelerated payments or prepayments to support the subcontractor’s efforts.”

We also reached out to Lakeside Alliance, and a spokesperson said in a statement: “Projects of this scale and complexity are inherently demanding. The Obama Presidential Center involved multiple structures, thousands of design documents, and hundreds of trade partners and community businesses. As with many major construction projects, contractual closeout — including the review and resolution of outstanding invoices, change orders, and other project matters — continues long after the doors open.”

The spokesperson said that Lakeside “continues to work to support the businesses that helped deliver this project” and remains “committed to working through outstanding matters to successfully close out the project.”

We asked Stan Martin, an attorney who has practiced construction law for more than 40 years, whether the payment flow described by the Obama Foundation is the way construction projects typically work — with an owner paying the main contractor, who then is responsible for hiring and paying subcontractors. He said that it was.

“The most common project delivery structure is for the project owner to engage one contractor,” Martin said. “The contractor, in turn, engages a number of subcontractors who perform the different aspects of the project. The owner typically has one contract with the contractor, and no contractual relationship with any subcontractors.”

Shareef told us that regardless of which entity specifically owes money for the outstanding invoices, “the buck stops with the owner” in his view. He said there must be a way for the Obama family or foundation to correct this. “Nothing has been resolved,” Shareef said regarding the companies that have reached out to him.

Specific Disputes

One subcontractor who has been quoted by name is Michael Owen, president of Adamson Plumbing Contractors, who has said his company is owed about $4 million out of the approximately $12 million worth of work the company performed. Crain’s reported that Owen said the original bid was for $6.9 million of work.

Owen told Crain’s and Fox News that delays and change orders increased the cost. He described a dispute with a mechanical engineering consultant over a type of clamp his firm used, which led to his firm having to redo the work at a cost of about $800,000, Crain’s reported. Fox News reported that Owen, whose company isn’t minority-owned, “has been trying to recover money it says it is owed from parties involved and has not filed a lawsuit.”

The most prominent dispute involves II in One Contractors, which in January 2025 sued structural engineering firm Thornton Tomasetti, claiming that the firm had engaged in racial discrimination by making “unfair” and “false” statements about the quality of concrete work done by II in One and other companies. The lawsuit seeks at least $40.8 million for work done by the concrete companies. In a motion to dismiss the suit, attorneys for Tomasetti said the plaintiffs “allege no verifiable falsehood.”

The case is still pending in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. 

Fox News reported that two minority-owned subcontractors for the project had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2024. Snopes.com quoted an attorney for one of the companies, Vision Painting & Decorating Services, as saying the bankruptcy was “obviously” due to the Obama Presidential Center being “way behind schedule and other public work constraints.”

The other company, Glass Management Services, said in a March 2025 court filing that its bankruptcy “was caused, in part, by significant project delays, cost overruns, and financial harm resulting from defects in Concrete Collective’s work” on the presidential center, Snopes noted. The filing seeks information about whether Lakeside Alliance was aware of these issues before asking GMS to do the glass work.

We reached out to Vision Painting & Decorating Services and Glass Management Services, but we haven’t received a response.

According to the Cook County Clerk’s Office, several companies have filed mechanic’s liens against the Obama center property seeking payment. A mechanic’s lien is a legal claim that unpaid parties (such as subcontractors) can attach to the property that they worked on to block it from being sold or refinanced without settling the payment.

Clearly, there are ongoing disputes among subcontractors, other firms and the general contractor. The Obama Foundation maintains that it has paid Lakeside and has “no direct legal agreements” with the subcontractors. Lakeside hasn’t disputed that.

“The Obama Presidential Center stands as a testament to the dedication and hard work of thousands of craftspeople, trade partners, community members, and stakeholders,” the Lakeside Alliance spokesperson told us. The alliance “is appreciative of everyone who contributed to making this vision a reality and proud of the lasting impact the project will have for generations to come.”

Editor’s note: FactCheck.org does not accept advertising. We rely on grants and individual donations from people like you. Please consider a donation. Credit card donations may be made through our “Donate” page. If you prefer to give by check, send to: FactCheck.org, Annenberg Public Policy Center, P.O. Box 58100, Philadelphia, PA 19102. 

The post Explaining What We Know About the Obama Presidential Center Contractor Disputes appeared first on FactCheck.org.

The president said the U.S. will impose a 20 percent fee on shipping through the Strait of Hormuz despite official assertions that fees would violate international law.

South Carolina governor asks Darline Graham Nordone to replace senator who died on Saturday, after Trump recommendation

• Sign up for the Breaking News US newsletter email

Henry McMaster, South Carolina’s governor, appointed Lindsey Graham’s sister, Darline Graham Nordone, to replace him in the Senate following his death on Saturday, after Donald Trump recommended that she be given the role.

Her appointment was welcomed by lawmakers from both parties, who saw Nordone as an appropriate replacement for the brother who had raised her after their parents died when she was a teenager.

Developers and public beta testers can try an early version of the software now before Apple releases it to the general public this fall.

The memory shortage is likely to lead to fewer budget devices and more refurbished models, a report says, as Apple and Samsung gain market share.

I have a love-hate relationship with Sun’s NFS. Since it was so prevalent, it’s a go-to for getting stuff on and off the classic UNIX workstations I love to explore, but at the same time, it also never seems to work right away. However, the technology NFS was designed to replace was apparently quite a bit worse. Sun sold diskless workstations before NFS, which used something called nd (network disk). The problems with nd stem from a limitation of SunOS at the time. Since SunOS only provided support for a maximum of eight partitions per physical disk, nd offered the ability to create subpartitions, of which you had to manually create and remember the start and end sectors.

That’s a recipe for problems. But wait, there’s more!

For extra bonus problems, you might run out of available partitions to use on your server disk because you needed all of the available ones for regular filesystems and your swap area. If you were in this situation you could take the dangerous but necessary step of specifying your network disks using the special ‘c’ partition (cf dkinfo(8)), which was conventionally used to provide access to the entire disk. This was extra dangerous because you had to make sure that the nd disks you specified weren’t overlapping into any regular partitions that you were using, since as nd(8) says, nd itself did no sanity checking. If you said sectors X to Y were network disk X, that’s what they were, and goodness help you if some of them were also something else.

↫ Chris Siedenmann

And this isn’t even everything. Every part of this sounds horrid, and I can totally understand seeing NFS as a godsend compared to nd. It’s depressing that we’re in 2026 now, and the basic task of sending a file from one computer to another over your own network often still a total clusterfuck.

Amid growing speculation about Mitch McConnell’s health after he spent weeks out of the public eye following a hospitalization, the Republican Kentucky senator’s office released a statement and image July 12.

The image shows McConnell wearing jeans and a red checkered shirt, supported by pillows, alongside his wife, Elaine Chao, and holding a newspaper in his right hand.  

Statement From Senator Mitch McConnell

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) released the following note to constituents regarding his hospitalization and recovery:

“To my fellow Kentuckians –

“When you elected me to a seventh term and made me our… pic.twitter.com/kfx2GKqd38

— CSPAN (@cspan) July 12, 2026

Social media users, including conservative activist Laura Loomer, quickly questioned the photo’s authenticity, saying parts of the image appeared generated with artificial intelligence. Some said the photo was a recycled or altered photograph from a 2023 incident in which McConnell fell and was hospitalized, with one user saying the photo was "widely shared" in 2023. 

X’s chatbot Grok repeated the claims, responding, "The photo McConnell's office released yesterday with Elaine Chao is the exact same one from his April 2023 recovery after a fall and concussion."

Yes, the photo McConnell's office released yesterday with Elaine Chao is the exact same one from his April 2023 recovery after a fall and concussion.

Side-by-side details match perfectly: the red gingham shirt, pose, smile, glasses, background, blue chair, lighting, and even…

— Grok (@grok) July 13, 2026

McConnell’s statement, issued shortly after U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham died of a sudden aortic dissection and amid rumors that McConnell was in critical condition, was intended to address that speculation and provide more details about McConnell’s medical condition.

McConnell said in the statement that he was hospitalized after he fell and was briefly unconscious, and later developed pneumonia. He said doctors determined he had no broken bones, concussion, heart attack, stroke, tumors or hemorrhages. He has since moved to a rehabilitation facility. 

We found no evidence the photo existed online before July 12. Two digital forensics experts who examined the image told PolitiFact they found no indication it was generated by AI or digitally manipulated.

Experts find no signs of AI generation

Matthew Stamm, a Drexel University professor who researches multimedia forensics, told PolitiFact that he and a doctoral student used a digital forensic technique developed in his lab to analyze the image’s pixels for clues whether AI was used to create it. The analysis found no evidence of AI generation, he said. 

 "This approach did not find evidence that the image is AI generated," Stamm said.

Hany Farid, a digital forensics expert and cofounder of GetReal Security, which develops tools to detect deepfakes and manipulated media, said his team analyzed the faces, lighting and shading and other elements of the image and found no evidence of AI generation.

We also checked the images against image verification tools from OpenAI and Google, which can check for markers that the image was generated using ChatGPT or Gemini. Neither detected signals associated with those generation tools.

No evidence McConnell photo is from 2023

Shortly after McConnell released the photo, social media users posted results purportedly from Google's AI search and Grok that said it was from McConnell’s 2023 hospitalization. The posts do not link to a dated photo or archive establishing a link. 

News articles and released photos from around McConnell’s 2023 hospitalization show no other photos showing McConnell in a medical setting. 

Photos published in May 2023 by Getty Images, after McConnell’s earlier hospitalization, show him wearing the same red checkered shirt under a suit jacket in the U.S. Capitol. But the 2026 image doesn’t appear to be a copy or edit of those images.

Stamm said there’s no ironclad way to verify when a photo was taken once it’s been transmitted online, because the transmittal can change the metadata that may carry that information. Still, there’s no evidence the photo, or a photo like it, existed online before July 12.

Social media users drew attention to blurry text on the newspaper in McConnell’s hand, calling it evidence of image tampering or AI generation. But the newspaper in McConnell’s hand in the photo is consistent with The Washington Post’s Sunday, July 12 Sports page, according to an X post by The Washington Post’s media reporter Scott Nover. 

Stamm said that the text’s appearance is a normal effect of the photo resolution, distance and viewing angle, as well as the compression that is performed on most cameras. 

"This can cause a little bit of blurring," he said. "This is normal. This happens inside everyone’s camera. It’s not a sign that something is altered." 

Users also began scrutinizing the framing between the photo published by news outlets and the photo as it appears on McConnell’s website, with some pointing to a cropped version as the "original" 2023 photo. 

On McConnell’s website, the photo accompanying the press release is cropped to a landscape aspect ratio, with the top and bottom partially cut out. The image contains just the corner of the newspaper. 

But it appears to be just a simple crop of the larger image, Stamm said. 

McConnell’s Senate website contains a carousel of news items with images attached that use the same aspect ratio, meaning the photo was potentially cropped to fit a predefined size for the website. 

How to spot AI photos

AI-generated photos are getting harder and harder to detect, but there are a few ways you can check for evidence of AI use in a photo. 

First, some tools that can create AI images add an imperceptible watermark to the image which can then be found using the company’s tools. For example, Google’s Gemini can check for evidence of the watermark SynthID, while OpenAI’s verify page can detect if an image contains markers of ChatGPT generation. 

Other online websites that check for evidence of generative AI in images can be useful, but they’re not perfect. Stamm said some online AI detectors are better than others, but they shouldn’t be taken as definitive. 

Stamm said people should investigate when they see an image that causes a strong reaction. Stamm suggested looking for multiple sources of information that confirm the photo’s legitimacy — although, in this case, McConnell’s office is the only source of the image so far.

"The first thing you should do is slow down and take it with a grain of salt," he said. "We’re seeing right here, this doesn’t show evidence of AI generation. The best thing, if people are questioning this, is look for other photos."

Our ruling

Social media posts said a photo that McConnell released on July 12 is from his 2023 hospitalization or is AI generated.

We found no evidence the photo had been shared online before its July 12 release. Digital forensics experts told PolitiFact the photo shows no signs of generative AI. 

We rate the claims False.

German textile firm ZEGO has filed for insolvency and is blaming a March cyberattack that shut down production for nearly six weeks. "ZEGO's filing adds another name to the short but growing list of companies that say a digital break-in was commercially fatal to their business," reports The Register. From the report: In a notice to customers and suppliers, the organization said it had exhausted every available option before seeking insolvency protection. Managing director Johannes Zenglein described the filing as "one of the most difficult steps in our company's 37-year history." "The cyberattack of March 29, 2026, however, impacted our company to an extent that we could not fully compensate for despite our best efforts," Zenglein wrote. "The consequences resulted in a production outage of nearly six weeks and significant financial strain. These effects ultimately impacted our financial situation so severely that filing for insolvency became necessary." ZEGO did not disclose what kind of attack it suffered, whether ransomware was involved, who was behind it, or whether customer or employee data was compromised. What it has made clear is that the operational disruption alone was enough to push the business beyond the point of recovery. ZEGO said insolvency proceedings have now been initiated, but insisted the filing does not necessarily spell the end of the business. It said it plans to keep production running while administrators attempt to restructure the business, preserve jobs, and keep customers and suppliers on board.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

@justgoldssister Hiya, apologies for the delay, had a busy weekend... Sorry to hear after all the hard work that your sister has lost her daystreak.
Sooooo frustrating.

Well, trappedinanelevator and I both just reappeared on the leader board after a few days of coming off.
We both put it down to FM doing something in the background with the app but we have no idea.

I wrote via their ticket system to FM who explained they have no way of reinstating anyone on to the leader board and apologised for the trouble, giving me tips on making sure I had a signal etc. While in communication with them and giving them the information they asked for... I just reappeared on the leaderboard.

Trappedinanelevator now goes under the name of FM Breaks Daystreaks. Maybe you can track him down on the OW app?

I guess if your sister's streak doesn't show after a few days that could be that.

The same happened to Fused and his never came back.

Good luck.

OSNews covered the downfall of Nokia extensively back when it was happening, but I must admit that seeing this whole story in “retrospectives” now makes me feel so incredibly old. This story played out roughly between 2007 and 2016 – in the grand scheme of things, the end of Nokia’s phone business wasn’t that long ago! Zeit, bitte bleib stehen.

Anyway, here’s another retrospective, but this one I definitely like a bit more than the countless others we’ve seen, because it ends on the part of the story often left out: Nokia not only survived, it’s actually thriving.

The company itself ultimately survived, even if the transition wasn’t painless. Nokia’s revenues, which peaked in 2007, fell sharply through the mid-2010s before the company refocused on a decades-old business line—telecom infrastructure—that many had forgotten Nokia was even in. Nokia now ranks among the world’s top three suppliers of 5G network equipment, serving carriers across more than 125 countries, alongside Ericsson and Huawei. Although the company could never quite crack the smartphone, it now plays a key role in providing the network backbone those smartphones run on.

↫ Chris Chinchilla at IEEE Spectrum

From a business perspective, I honestly doubt Nokia’s phone business could’ve survived to this day, even if they had responded to the arrival of the iPhone sooner, and even if they didn’t do the stupid thing of focusing on Windows Phone first and had just embraced Android right away. Obviously, a Nokia with its own touch-era smartphone operating system would never have survived – none of them did – and even if they went with Android from the onset, I think the eventual onslaught of Samsung, which has killed many a popular smartphone brand, would’ve trampled Nokia too.

In a better version of our world, Nokia would’ve survived with its own smartphone operating system, based on Symbian or not, and it would’ve been Europe’s strong, consistent answer to the Americans’ iOS and Android. While Nokia would’ve still been a business and would’ve undoubtedly tried the same anti-user shenanigans as Apple and Google, they’d at least be easier to reign in regulatory-wise. You’d hope.

The EU should’ve never allowed Nokia’s smartphone business to be sold to Microsoft.

According to a report, the company plans to skip higher-performance versions of some of its processors along the way.

Thanks to pollution, overpopulation and the climate crisis, Earth is facing a terrifying new crisis: an irreversible 'water bankruptcy'. Now, fights over water have ramped up across the world, including in the US west. Host Carter Sherman speaks with Guardian extreme weather correspondent Gabrielle Canon about the battle over the future of the Colorado River Basin, whose water sustains some 40 million people across seven states – but is now drying up. Gabrielle recently rafted down the basin's last 'wild' river, the Yampa. Damming or diverting the Yampa could bring the west some much-needed hydration. It may also devastate the vast natural ecosystem that relies on the river's free-flowing waters. Also: Carter and Kai Wright react to the death of South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham

• Gabrielle Canon’s story on the Yampa River

• Guardian stories on Lindsey Graham:

  • Analysis on Graham as dealmaker

  • The scramble to replace Graham

  • Lindsey Graham in his own words

We sifted through hundreds of discounts to find the biggest savings that you need to check out.

Georgia Power says building a new transmission line will require acquiring more than 300 parcels of land, including residential properties.

U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams said President Trump's lawsuit against the IRS had been filed for an "improper purpose."

The suit poses a new challenge to the $110 billion deal that would unite two of the nation's largest media companies.

South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham's sudden death late Saturday has set off a scramble for who will succeed him in the Senate.

Here are hints and answers for the NYT Strands puzzle for July 14 No. 863.

Here are hints and the answer for today's Wordle for July 14, No. 1,851.

Here are some hints and the answers for the NYT Connections puzzle for July 14, No. 1,129.

A coalition of 12 states led by California is suing to block the $111 billion Paramount Skydance-Warner Bros. merger, arguing it would reduce competition in theatrical distribution, blockbuster films, and basic cable licensing. The challenge (PDF) defies the DOJ's approval of the deal. Variety reports: The coalition, led by California Attorney General Rob Bonta, alleges that the $111 billion transaction violates the Clayton Act by lessening competition in three distinct markets: wide-release theatrical distribution, "top-grossing" theatrical distribution, and basic cable licensing. "The unlawful merger of these two entertainment behemoths would lead to higher prices, lower quality, and less content for film and television, harming movie theaters, basic cable distributors, and ultimately, audiences on every sofa and movie theater seat in the U.S.," Bonta said in a statement on Monday. The suit argues that the combined company will control 27% of the wide-release theatrical distribution market, 30% of the submarket comprising "anticipated blockbuster films," and 27% of the basic cable bundle. The states argue that such consolidation will harm theaters and cable and satellite providers that rely on competition among distributors. Paramount and Warner Bros. are two of the five remaining legacy studios. Together, all five -- including Disney, Sony and Universal -- control 86% of theatrical distribution and 90% of blockbuster distribution, the states said. Warner Bros. and Paramount are also the second- and third-largest basic cable distributors, respectively. [...] The states are expected to seek an injunction to block the transaction, which Paramount expects to close sometime after July 22. The 12 states in the coalition are Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, and Washington. [...] All are represented by Democratic attorneys general. "Consolidation here not only leads to higher prices -- it also leads to fewer opportunities for important stories to come to life, and fewer ways for audiences to encounter stories, ideas, and perspectives beyond their own experiences," Bonta said. "In this country, no one is above the law. With this lawsuit, California and our sister states are fighting for free and fair markets, not rigged markets. America has no kings in government or our economy."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Cyclosporiasis outbreak comes a year after Trump officials cut funding for state and local health departments

• What is cyclosporiasis, the parasitic illness causing ‘explosive’ diarrhea?

State health officials in Michigan and Ohio are reporting thousands of cases of cyclosporiasis – a parasitic infection that causes “watery diarrhea”, loss of appetite and weight loss.

The outbreak of more than 2,800 cases comes a year after the Trump administration cut funding to state and local health departments and reduced the remit of a program dedicated to coordinating information on foodborne illness, including of cyclospora.

Instead of an outright ban, EU President Ursula von der Leyen is suggesting social media start dates that will allow kids gradual access to platforms.

Carl McDaniel was ‘respectful distance’ from animal when it charged and has severe injuries, including broken bones

A tourist who was tossed 8ft in the air by a bison at Wyoming’s Yellowstone national park – an encounter viewed by more than a million social media users thanks to a viral video online – has been identified as a “community-minded” grandfather from Washington state.

Carl McDaniel had severe injuries including broken bones after Friday’s campsite encounter with the bison, which was posted to YouTube by the Wyoming news outlet Cowboy State Daily. A photographer named Mike MacLeod rushed to help the victim on the ground after making the recording.

Lawmakers face obstacles, including demands from Trump, Mitch McConnell’s absence and senator’s sudden death

Republican lawmakers return to the Capitol this week facing a lengthy to-do list and Donald Trump’s demands for new voting restrictions, as Democrats jockey for an advantage ahead of the November midterm elections.

Lawmakers from both parties are eager to highlight before voters legislative victories ahead of the midterms, when control of Congress is at stake. But for Senate Republicans, who are already navigating an array of demands from Trump, their agenda grew further complicated over the weekend with the death of Lindsey Graham, the budget committee chair who was a key player in negotiating a party-line bill to fund additional defense spending and other priorities outlined by the president.

French president Emmanuel Macron has been hosting leaders amid hopes that Ukraine’s recent advances could force Putin towards negotiations

in Kyiv

Meanwhile, Russia has been forced to suspend shipping in the Sea of Azov after 90 vessels were targeted by Ukrainian drones in less than a week.

Shabana Mahmood to make it possible to deport Commonwealth citizens convicted of serious criminality

The home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, will amend the immigration bill to allow the deportation of the Rochdale grooming gang, the first step in removing Shabir Ahmed from the UK.

At present, Ahmed cannot be deported because of a 1971 law applying to Commonwealth citizens who arrived in the UK more than 50 years ago.

Don’t float through the world in an AirPod bubble – enjoy music or podcasts and carry on using these tested favorites

• I tested 42 pairs of wireless earbuds to find the best in US

• Sign up for the Filter US newsletter, your weekly guide to buying fewer, better things

In a feat of engineering that borders on magic, the best wireless earbuds can silence the noisy world around you at the tap of a finger. So, why would you buy open earbuds, which are specifically designed to let in environmental sounds?

Frankly, I didn’t understand the appeal of them either until I started testing them, and now I use open earbuds even more than my noise-cancelling earbuds. For situations from hiking to running errands, these are the headphones you should be wearing. Here’s what you’re missing out on, and a few of the best pairs to try.

Best overall open-ear earbuds:
Soundcore Aeroclip Open-Ear Earbuds

Best premium open-ear earbuds:
Bose Ultra Open Earbuds

The last five days were very challenging for the 125 students participating in the ASC26 competition. It began with a long weekend of building their cluster and getting the environment settled in. When they began testing the applications, many teams found that the optimizations that worked on their university training systems didn’t work on their competition boxes. Ouch.

But they carried on. Now, finally, the competition is over – almost. It’s now time to discuss what they’ve done with the HPC expert judges panel. In years past, each of the 25 teams would make a 15-minute presentation to the judges. This was a long slog for both the students and those of us on the panel.

It’s different for 2026. Each team gets to produce a display showing off what they know and what they’ve learned over the past week. Judges will walk around the area, visiting with each team, and asking some sharp questions.

Some judges worked solo while others grouped up. HPC luminaries Jack Dongarra, Torsten Hoefler, and Ewa Deming moved as a group from team to team.

Dr. Jack has been attending ASC events and judging the competition almost from the beginning. Torsten and Ewa have done it multiple years as well.

Teams took vastly different approaches when designing their displays, ranging from the simple and direct whiteboard look to standard professional design to the outright ornate.

This wasn’t a trivial thing, the top team had the chance to add 10 points to their score, which could make all the difference in the world in their final score and standing.

So Who Won What?

I usually get the final scores on each component of the competition so I can show the horse race day-by-day. It also gives me a chance to shine a light on teams who did great on one application, for example, but didn’t win an overall award. I didn’t get the scores for ASC26, so I only have the official results to go on.

Group Competition Award – Qinghai University, Beihang University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, EAFIT University and Beijing Normal University (representative from each of the winning teams in the picture…and nicely grouped)

Application Innovation Awards – Zhejiang University, Fudan University, Beijing University of Posts & Telecommunications: These go to the teams that achieved the top score on AMSS-NCKU (Black Hole), QiboTN (quantum) or the Mystery Application (LeWorldModel.)

The e Prize – Peking University who achieved the highest team score on Embodied World Model Optimization task. This was the group task where university teams worked together on the application then ran the optimized solution on their own system. (My pictures of Team Peking on stage were blocked by other photographers! But I get a good one a little later, wait for it.)

Best Presentation Award – Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Highest LINPACK – Qilu University of Technology

This is the fourth ASC competition for Team Qilu and their first major award. Congratulations!

Silver Medal – Tsinghua University

This marks the 36^th competition for a team from Tsinghua. They’ve won an incredible 19 gold medals, seven silver (including this one), four bronze, and five LINPACK awards. I’d love to see their trophy case, it’s gotta be big, right?

Champion – Peking University

Peking University is the gold medal winner at ASC26, topping their cross-town rival Tsinghua for Beijing bragging rights.(They get a bigger picture in this article too.)

This is their 13^th cluster competition and certainly wasn’t unlucky.

They might need a trophy case now since they’ve won three gold, two silver, and a Highest LINPACK award. Great job Team Peking!

The awards ceremony concluded with short talks from Jack Dongarra and Qian Depei, who is Chair of the Sun-Yat Sen University AI Research Institute. They both discussed the value of these competitions for the students and the HPC/AI community as a whole. Perfect way to end the evening.

Yet another highly successful ASC cluster competition. Students learned a lot about advanced HPC, they had the chance to talk to employers at the job fair, and they were able to test themselves against the fiendish set of tasks laid out by the organizers. They also made friendships with students from other universities and countries. The ASC organizers did another outstanding job on this competition. So where’s the next one?

The post ASC26 Wuxi Wrap Up: Awards & Trophies appeared first on HPCwire.

The Penn State team behind these temporary tats hopes they can help spot heart attacks or power robotic prosthetics.

According to the Wall Street Journal (paywalled), Apple agreed to use Intel's U.S. chipmaking plants after White House officials pressured Tim Cook during tariff-relief talks last summer. MacRumors reports: In August 2025, Apple CEO Tim Cook was in Washington to lobby the Trump administration to drop its proposed 100 percent tariff on semiconductor imports -- a levy that would have raised costs across Apple's product line. Apple reportedly secured an exemption after pledging to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in the U.S., although many of those investments were already planned. During the meetings, president Trump and commerce secretary Howard Lutnick are said to have urged Cook to use Intel's fabrication plants to make some of Apple's chips. The link between the tariff talks and the Apple-Intel deal had not been previously reported. Almost a year later, Trump announced via his Truth Social platform that Apple would begin using Intel-made chips in some products. "We need to design and build our Chips right here in America," the president posted. The news sent Intel shares to record highs. According to a person familiar with the negotiations cited by the WSJ, Apple plans to have Intel make chips for both Mac laptops and iPhones. The report doesn't say which chips or in what volume, and Apple is expected to remain reliant on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, or TSMC, for the majority of its custom silicon.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

After a wild attack on the media, Reform’s deputy leader joins other MPs in the Commons offering tributes rather than speculation

This is the third murder of either a sitting or former MP that I’ve covered in the last 10 years. It doesn’t get any easier or less shocking. Every death diminishes us all. The least you would hope is for politicians to behave with dignity. To set an example. For those who knew Ann Widdecombe to express their personal loss, for party leaders and ministers to convey the horror of her death and offer their condolences to her family and friends. Probably best for everyone else to say as little as possible for now.

The police have asked for everyone to refrain from speculating about the motives of the suspect, who, as of Monday lunchtime, was still being questioned by counter-terrorism officers, and not to politicise the murder if possible. A time for our political class to behave like grownups. And the overwhelming majority have done that. Just for now, even Nigel Farage has stopped acting as if he were the detective leading the investigation by offering his insights to every passing TV crew, and has fallen silent.

Ukraine and nine other countries including UK issue joint statement as leaders meet Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Paris

Ukraine and nine other countries including the UK, Germany and France are to build a shared protection programme for Europe against ballistic missiles, using Kyiv’s experience in fighting Russia’s full-scale invasion for more than four years.

“Our goal is to build a shared ballistic missile defence capability for Europe,” the 10 nations said in a statement on Monday as leaders met the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, for talks in Paris.

Bipartisan group argue in lawsuit that $110bn merger would hurt competition and lead to thousands of job losses

A dozen US state attorneys general are seeking to block the $110bn merger of Paramount Skydance and Warner Bros Discovery, arguing in a lawsuit filed on Monday that it would hurt competition and lead to higher prices for consumers.

The coalition behind the lawsuit is led by the California attorney general, Rob Bonta, who has been a staunch critic of the merger since it was agreed to in February after a bidding war between David Ellison’s Paramount Skydance and Netflix.