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With the first votes in the Republican presidential nomination calendar less than four months away, Fox News' Dana Perino predicts that Wednesday's second GOP primary debate "is where the rubber meets the road." Perino, along with Fox Business' Stuart Varney and UNIVISION’s Ilia Calderón will co-moderate the debate, which will take place at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California .  Pointing back to last month's first debate, a Fox News hosted showdown in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, longtime Republican consultant David Kochel said "everybody gets an introduction. Do a little bit of biography. Make your full opening statement." "The second debate is about trajectory and who’s capable of really sustaining some momentum," Kochel, a veteran of numerous GOP presidential campaigns, emphasized. FIRST ON FOX: THE RNC RAISES THE BAR FOR THE CANDIDATES TO MAKE THE STAGE AT THE THIRD PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE Dave Carney, another l...

Kate Knibbs / Wired : A look at the flood of near-identical YouTube obituary videos, where men read obituaries scraped from funeral homes, newspapers, and other authorized publishers   —  If you Google someone who recently died, you might see a flood of near-identical videos of men reading obits.  Here's why.

FIRST ON FOX: Some Republican lawmakers remain supportive of the House speaker in the fight over approving the government's budget and avoiding a shutdown. Two House GOP lawmakers, who asked to remain anonymous to speak more freely, spoke to Fox News Digital about the ongoing negotiations to pass a continuing resolution to fund the government. The House convened on Thursday after a defense spending bill failed after several GOP holdouts — including Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida — shot down the measure that House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., was pushing to pass. "They got him hostage. And the truth is, they're not holding him hostage, they're holding the whole conference hostage," one congressman told Fox News Digital. The lawmaker noted that 212 House Republicans supporting the measure were contrasted by the six no votes, though they noted that Oklahoma GOP Rep. Tom Cole's no vote "was a procedural thing." MCCARTHY UNVEILS NEW PLAN TO AVOID...

Several left-wing activists and commentators took to social media to issue an identical message on Friday, equating the indictment of Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., on bribery charges to alleged ethics violations by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. The message, which suggest that either Menendez and Thomas should both step down from their roles or that Menendez should only be pushed to resign if Thomas does, came after it was alleged in a federal indictment that the New Jersey senator had accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes in exchange for favors. "Here's the deal: Menendez resigns. Clarence Thomas resigns. One standard. Corruption is corruption," Washington Post columnist Jennifer Rubin wrote in a post to X, formerly known as Twitter. Rubin's message was echoed by several others, including retired Lt. Col.  Alexander Vindman , who served as a witness during the first impeachment proceedings of former President Donald Trump. MENENDEZ DEFIANT AS...

Sanket Vijayasarathy / 91mobiles : A leaked promo video for the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro reveals camera features, including an Audio Eraser, the ability to swap faces, manual controls, and more   —  - A new promo video focuses on the many camera features of the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro.  — Both the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro will get a 50MP primary camera.

The Hungarian foreign minister says his country is hoping for a return of former President Donald Trump to the White House, as he says the relationship between the U.S. and Hungary has deteriorated due to the "lecturing" and interference in policy by the Biden administration. Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto told Fox News Digital that his country, which is led by a conservative government, had strong relations with the U.S. during the Trump administration, but that it has soured with the new Biden administration . "We had the best ever political relationship with the United States during the term of President Trump, the best ever political relationship. And I think the reason for that was that President Trump has based this bilateral relationship on mutual respect, and he did not have the intention to judge, to lecture or educate us," he said. "He concentrated on America to develop — America First — and he concentrated on the relationship of ours to develop ...

Leo Schwartz / Fortune : Documents: Coinbase explored acquiring FTX Europe after FTX's November 2022 bankruptcy, as part of Coinbase's goal to expand its overseas derivatives business   —  In its pursuit to build out crypto derivatives offerings worldwide, Coinbase explored an acquisition of FTX's European entity following …

The Pentagon quietly reversed its gender pronoun policy for award citations on Tuesday after it had previously updated its Manual of Military Decorations and Awards to require the use of "gender-neutral" pronouns for six joint awards. "This change revises the language used in Joint award citations … and updates references," the adjustment, known as "Change 6" states. In August, the Department of Defense (DOD) issued an unannounced change to the manual to require award citations to use "themself" — a word not recognized by standard English — instead of "himself" or "herself." The language was discovered by the conservative think tank Heritage Foundation. The foundation reported that the end-of-tour award for Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was returned because he used gender-specific pronouns for his citation.  ARMY VETERAN GOP REP SAYS US TRYING TO 'OUT-PRONOUN OUR ENEMIES' IN PUSH TO ...

Louise Matsakis / Semafor : Sources: White House considers requiring cloud companies to disclose when a customer purchases computing resources beyond a threshold, as part of an EO on AI   —  The White House is considering requiring cloud computing firms to report some information about their customers to the U.S. government …

President Biden has agreed to send a small number of long-range missiles to Ukraine to bolster Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's war effort against Russia, Fox News has confirmed. The president made the offer during his meeting with Zelenskyy Thursday, U.S. officials said. Information about number, type and date of delivery was not disclosed so as not to undermine Ukraine's use of the weapons.  The White House and National Security Council declined to comment.  Biden earlier had announced a $325 million security assistance package for Ukraine after he met with Zelenskyy, who visited the Capitol Thursday for the second time since Russia invaded his country in February 2022. BIDEN ANNOUNCES $325M AID PACKAGE TO UKRAINE AFTER MEETING WITH ZELENSKYY Capping his visit, which included meetings and discussions with lawmakers and Pentagon officials, Zelenskyy met with Biden at the White House before the $325 million plan was unveiled. According to the U.S. Department o...

Conservatives praised the previously Democratic mayor of Dallas, Texas, on Friday after he announced in an op-ed that he was switching to the Republican Party. Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson wrote in the Wall Street Journal on Friday that he is leaving the Democratic Party because "the future of America’s great urban centers depends on the willingness of the nation’s mayors to champion law and order and practice fiscal conservatism." "Welcome, Mayor!" Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton posted on X , formerly known as Twitter. "Texas is getting more Red every day," Texas Gov. Greg Abbott posted on X. DALLAS MAYOR ERIC JOHNSON SAYS 'RACISM WITHIN THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY' IS '800 LB GORILLA IN THE ROOM' "Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson switches to Republican Party. He’s pro law enforcement & won’t tolerate leftist agendas. Two of the 10 largest cities in America now have Republican Mayors & they are both in Texas." "We are thril...

Bryant Francis / Game Developer : Unity apologizes and says games made with Unity Personal will be exempt from its Runtime Fee, which will only apply to games made with Unity versions from 2024   —  Unity's updated Runtime Fee will no longer apply to games made on Unity Personal, and will only apply beginning with the next LTS version of Unity.

Lara O'Reilly / Insider : TikTok is testing a Google integration in different markets; researcher: TikTok's search feature includes an in-app option to search the same query on Google   —  - TikTok is testing a search partnership with Google.  — An option to search on Google.com now appears on some searches within the TikTok app.

The House of Representatives will send members home for the week Thursday afternoon amid chaos and division over how to fund the government in the next fiscal year, Fox News has learned. Lawmakers are likely to return on Tuesday at the earliest due to the Yom Kippur holiday, leaving less than a week for Congress to hash out a spending deal by Sept. 30. If no action is taken, the government risks falling into a partial shutdown.  A small group of House GOP negotiators will remain on Capitol Hill trying to cobble together a deal, Fox News was told. Members are expected to be ready to return if a vote is called.  It comes hours after a critical vote to advance one of House Republicans' 12 appropriations bills, specifically covering defense spending, failed to pass for the second time this week, dealing an embarrassing blow to GOP leaders. This story is breaking and will be updated…

Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch : Mesh, which helps customers transfer and manage digital assets like crypto, raised a $22M Series A led by Money Forward, bringing its total raised to $32M   —  Mesh (formerly Front Finance), a startup developing a service to help customers transfer and manage digital assets like crypto …

FIRST ON FOX : Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas , on Thursday took aim at the Biden administration for its decision to close border crossings near the site of a surge in mostly Venezuelan migrant men in Eagle Pass, Texas. Thousands of migrants flooded into the area on Wednesday, with some gathering under the main bridge as they sought shelter from the heat. Authorities estimated that at least 4,000 had moved in on Wednesday and on Thursday migrants continued to move across the nearby river into Texas. In a statement, Customs and Border Protection said it was temporarily suspending vehicle processing operations at two bridges in the area "in order to redirect personnel to assist the U.S. Border Patrol with taking migrants into custody." DHS TO OFFER WORK PERMITS, DEPORTATION PROTECTION TO OVER 470,000 VENEZUELANS AMID NEW BORDER SURGE "In response to this influx in encounters, we will continue to surge all available resources to expeditiously and safely process migrants,"...

Ben Weiss / Fortune : PayPal says select Venmo users can now purchase its stablecoin PYUSD, with a rollout to more users in the coming weeks, in addition to BTC, ETH, BCH, and LTC   —  PayPal announced on Wednesday that Venmo users will be able to buy PayPal's new stablecoin, PayPal USD, increasing the number …

Former President Barack Obama praised Pennsylvania for enacting automatic voter registration in the key swing state as conservatives cried foul over the move ahead of the 2024 election.  "Great news — starting today, Pennsylvania will begin automatic voter registration for folks getting a driver's license or state ID card at the DMV. Hopefully even more states will follow," Obama wrote on X, formerly Twitter.  But the move faced criticism from some conservatives, including Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton, who wrote to his 2.3 million followers, "Leftist Pennsylvania governor decides to ‘automatically’ register ‘voters’ — a legally-dubious and surefire way to make it easier for ineligible individuals to vote illegally."  "Breaking: Barack Obama, one of the most corrupt presidents in history, promotes illicit process to further undermine clean elections in Pennsylvania," Fitton added. TRUMP ALLEGES PELOSI TURNED DOWN 10,000 SOLDIERS AHEAD OF CA...

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch : Darrow, which uses AI to parse public documents for class action lawsuit potential, raised a $35M Series B led by Georgian and says ~50 companies use its tool   —  The U.S. is famous (or infamous) for its litigiousness: the country may not have the highest per capita amount of lawsuits …

Attorney General Merrick Garland was visibly outraged by accusations that he has operated the Justice Department with an anti-Catholic bias on Wednesday. Garland testified before the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, facing questions from Republicans relating to the investigation of Hunter Biden and other hot-button issues. Rep. Jefferson Van Drew, R-N.J., had a particularly contentious exchange regarding the Justice Department's handling of investigations into Catholic and pro-life groups. "Do you agree that traditional Catholics are violent extremists, yes or no?" Van Drew asked after listing a series of incidents of alleged anti-Catholic or anti-Christian bias. "I would be happy to answer all of those," Garland began before being cut off. PURPORTED FBI DOCUMENT SUGGESTS AGENCY MAY BE TARGETING CATHOLICS WHO ATTEND LATIN MASS "Attorney General, I control the time. I'm gonna ask you to answer the questions I ask," Van Drew said. "Y...

FIRST ON FOX: Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, vented frustration at his Republican colleagues who are opposing a stopgap proposal to avert a government shutdown cobbled together by the conservative House Freedom Caucus and the more pragmatic Main Street Caucus.  "If a Republican opposes a 30-day, 8% cut to the non-defense, non-veteran federal government with the best border security bill we've ever had attached to it, I honestly don't know what to say to my fellow Republicans other than you're gonna eat a shit sandwich, and you probably deserve to eat it," Roy told Fox News Digital on Wednesday. "I'm an equal opportunity basher of stupid, and I think this is stupid." It comes after negotiators for the Freedom Caucus, including Roy, and the Main Street Caucus unveiled their proposal for a continuing resolution, known as a CR, on Sunday night. It would cut discretionary government spending by 8% from current levels and included most of H.R. 2 save for a pr...

The Biden administration is pushing back against a demand by a conservative legal group that it reveals information about the illegal immigrants being considered for arrest and deportation, including their terror, cartel and gang affiliations -- arguing that, among other concerns, it could violate their privacy rights. America First Legal in 2021 filed a Freedom of Information Act request for weekly reports of proposed enforcement actions submitted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers to headquarters before they could arrest or deport those illegal immigrants.  This approval process took effect with the implementation of new guidance from DHS which narrowed ICE priorities to focusing on recent border crossers, public safety threats and national security threats. Information in those weekly reports includes names, addresses, visa information, and any gang, cartel or terror affiliations. In its document production to AFL, DHS significantly redacted much of the pe...

Andy Greenberg / Wired : Mandiant details UNC53, a China-backed group that hacked 29+ global orgs since 2022 by tricking staff into using malware-infected USB drives, mostly in Africa   —  Security researchers found USB-based Sogu espionage malware spreading within African operations of European and US firms.

Vice President Harris argued Tuesday that young people are experiencing "climate anxiety" that causes them to rethink major future plans like having a family due to the environmental impact.  At the latest stop in her national "Fight for Our Freedoms" college tour, Harris told an audience at the Reading Area Community College in Berks County, Pennsylvania, that the Biden-Harris ticket saw a record turnout of young voters during the 2020 election, inspiring the administration’s initiative toward student loan forgiveness, which recently hit a roadblock in court.  "We're not going to stop fighting for that. Because young people said, we're not leaving it to other people to decide how we're dealing with the climate crisis. You know, I've heard young leaders talk with me about a term they've coined, ‘climate anxiety,’" Harris said , pivoting, "Which is fear of the future and the unknown of whether it makes sense for you to even think...

Mackenzie Hawkins / Bloomberg : US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo says there is no evidence that SMIC can make the 7nm Kirin 9000s chips found in the Huawei Mate 60 Pro “at scale”   —  - Raimondo says she was ‘upset’ at phone release during visit  — US probing new chip, which raised questions on export limits

Fears over President Biden's old age are rampant within the Democratic Party, and one lawmaker revealed exactly what the "nightmare scenario" is for the party in the 2024 election cycle. The Washington Post interviewed dozens of Democratic officials and politicians on the state and federal levels regarding Biden's re-election bid. While they did not oppose his candidacy or name-drop other potential options, they were nevertheless nervous about putting forward an 80-year-old. One lawmaker, who the Post says spoke on condition of anonymity, painted a particularly worrying picture for the party. "The worst-case scenario is we get past the nominating process with President Biden as the nominee, and then he’s no longer able to continue on as the nominee," the lawmaker said. "That’s the nightmare scenario for Democrats." WATCH: BIDEN CONFUSES UKRAINE WITH RUSSIA, ZELENSKYY WITH PUTIN DURING GAFFE-FILLED TRIP TO LITHUANIA Biden would be 82 by the ti...

The U.S. Senate recently dropped its dress code requirement, sparking criticism from many conservatives both online and in Congress who suggested the move was made to appease Democratic Sen. John Fetterman. Fox News Digital confirmed on Sunday that the Senate will no longer enforce a dress code for senators. Senators will now be allowed to wear whatever they want but others entering the chamber must comply with the dress code, which is coats and ties for men and business attire for women.  Conservatives responded on X, formerly known as Twitter, criticizing Fetterman, who has routinely worn gym shorts and hoodies in the building and found a workaround to the legislative body's dress code rules by voting from the doorway of the Democrat cloakroom or the side entrance, making sure his vote is recorded before ducking out. "The Senate no longer enforcing a dress code for Senators to appease Fetterman is disgraceful," Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene posted...

Jon Victor / The Information : As Google prepares its Gemini multimodal LLM, a source says OpenAI is racing to debut GPT-Vision, which integrates multimodal image and text features into GPT-4   —  As fall approaches, Google and OpenAI are locked in a good ol' fashioned software race, aiming to launch the next generation of large-language models: multimodal.

Some House Republicans fear that Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas may get off the hook for his alleged mishandling of the U.S. border due to the new impeachment inquiry into President Biden. While House Republicans are overwhelmingly in favor of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy's newly announced impeachment inquiry, the House Oversight Committee has also been digging into Mayorkas for months. Lawmakers have repeatedly blasted the Biden administration official for his role in the ongoing crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border. "With Mayorkas, it grows worse and worse by the day," Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., said Monday. "I am worried that it’s going to go by the wayside." Other members of the Oversight Committee and Homeland Security Committee have echoed the sentiment. HOUSE HOMELAND GOP REPORT ACCUSES MAYORKAS OF ‘INTENTIONAL’ DERELICTION OF DUTY OVER BORDER CRISIS "This does shift the focus in our long-standing efforts to hold the administration ...

House Republicans held a members-only conference call with Freedom Caucus members on Sunday night in an attempt to avert a government shutdown , Fox News has learned. The goal of the call, which took place at 8 p.m., was to agree on a continuing resolution to fund the government for another month. The Freedom Caucus and House Republican leadership have been disputing over what a funding package could look like. Before the call took place, sources told Fox News Digital that there has been "good progress" between Freedom Caucus members and other Republicans. The interim spending bill, which is good for 31 days, is expected to renew current funding while incorporating more border and immigration-related spending. The House aims to vote on it on Thursday. HOUSE SPEAKER KEVIN MCCARTHY ANNOUNCES FORMAL IMPEACHMENT INQUIRY AGAINST PRESIDENT BIDEN The continuing resolution would also fund veteran and military spending at current levels while marking a 1% cut from fiscal year 20...

Will Douglas Heaven / MIT Technology Review : Q&A with DeepMind co-founder Mustafa Suleyman on maintaining AI optimism, how “interactive” AI will follow the generative AI wave, AI regulation, and more   —  DeepMind cofounder Mustafa Suleyman wants to build a chatbot that does a whole lot more than chat.