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Ben Church / CNN : A look at concerns about Saudi Arabia's sportswashing in esports as it hosts the Esports World Cup; Saudi's PIF has bought some of the biggest gaming companies   —  In the heart of Saudi Arabia's capital, a seismic moment for esports is underway; one which has triggered both excitement and concern across the industry.

President Biden claimed Thursday he's been  "in and out of battles" while addressing an audience of military service members and their families at Thursday's White House Fourth of July Barbecue.  "And by the way, I've been all over the world with you. I've been in and out of battles," the president, who never served in the military, though as Commander-in-Chief, met with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine in February 2023 and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel in October 2023. It's not the first time Biden has come under fire for remarks to military service members. In 2019, Biden came under fire for conflating and misrepresenting war stories after the Washington Post exposed a "moving but false war story" told on the campaign trail. Biden, then the former vice president and candidate for president, later defended what he said, saying the "central point" was accurate.  Veterans 4 America First Institute, a ...

Malcolm Owen / AppleInsider : Apple says it asked Epic to fix the buttons in a future version of the Epic Games Store submitted for review; Epic CEO Tim Sweeney says Epic will “fight this”   —  Mere hours after reports circulated that Apple had declined to approve the Epic Games Store for iOS in the EU …

The federal judge presiding over former President Trump's Florida case has paused several court deadlines to consider presidential immunity.  Trump's legal team presented a motion Friday seeking "a partial stay of further proceedings" in the case brought by special counsel Jack Smith "until President Trump's motions based on Presidential immunity and the Appointments and Appropriations Clauses are resolved." U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon on Saturday agreed to hear arguments, allowing two weeks for both camps to prepare briefs regarding the relevance of the Supreme Court's ruling on presidential immunity. TRUMP ASKS FLORIDA COURT TO PAUSE CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS CASE AFTER SUPREME COURT IMMUNITY DECISION Trump faces charges from Smith's investigation into his possession of classified materials.  He pleaded not guilty to all 37 felony counts from Smith’s probe , including willful retention of national defense information, conspiracy to obstr...

President Joe Biden, 81, had a post-debate "verbal check-in" with his physician, Dr. Kevin O'Connor, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters aboard Air Force One on Friday, despite telling reporters that Biden had not had any recent medical exams earlier this week. "He did have a short verbal check-in in the recent days about his cold, it wasn't a medical exam or a physical," Jean-Pierre said. "It was a conversation, and his doctor didn't think an examination was necessary." Jean-Pierre added that the doctor's call was "not unusual" and that Biden has a 24/7 medical unit that travels with him.  NEWSOM DOUBLES DOWN ON SUPPORT FOR BIDEN IN MICHIGAN: ‘I BELIEVE IN HIS CHARACTER’ "That is not because of just this president, because it's all presidents and it is a very different experience than what we understand that the American people experience," she said.  After Biden reportedly told Demo...

A consortium of Second Amendment advocacy groups and two residents filed suit seeking to block California’s new 11% excise tax on firearms, parts and ammunition. The case, Jaymes v. Maduros , alleged that the Supreme Court has previously ruled that constitutional rights should not be subject to taxation, and sought to block the tax that went into effect July 1. One of the precedents cited was Murdock v. Pennsylvania , in which the court sided with a Jehovah’s Witness who had been required to purchase a permit to evangelize door-to-door in Westmoreland County. In that regard, the Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC), National Rifle Association (NRA), California Rifle & Pistol Association and the two civilians filed their complaint against California Department of Tax & Fee Administration Director Nicolas Maduros in his official capacity, citing similar protections. WATCH: LAWMAKERS INVOKE HUNTER BIDEN, SECOND AMENDMENT WHILE OFFERING VARYING DEFENSES ON GUN LAWS FPC President B...

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch : Researcher: X is exploring more ways to integrate xAI's Grok, including the ability to ask Grok about X accounts and use Grok by highlighting text in the app   —  Elon Musk's X is exploring more ways to integrate xAI's Grok into the social networking app.  According to a series of recent discoveries …

Bloomberg : South Korea unveils a monitoring system to find crypto exchange accounts linked to “suspected” trading activity, as a new law takes effect on July 19   —  - Regulator asks exchanges to help detect questionable trades  — Measure comes alongside mandatory protections for investors

Bloomberg : Microsoft-owned Mojang is exploring deals in areas like merchandising, education, and streaming, on top of movies and TV series, as gaming sector growth slows   —  - 15-year-old game seeks partners in merchandising and education  — Microsoft-owned Mojang has adopted AI in content moderation

California Gov. Gavin Newsom remains steadfastly committed to the Biden-Harris 2024 presidential ticket, despite admitting during an Independence Day Democratic campaign event in Michigan that the presidential debate against former President Donald Trump "did not go as well" as Biden had hoped.  "I was asked and tasked by President Biden, proudly, to fly from California to Georgia to represent the campaign right after that debate," Newsom told a crowd of supporters at the Van Buren Dems BBQ for Biden-Harris in South Haven, Michigan, on Thursday.  "I had a lot of talking points in mind, you may have noticed if you saw me, I didn't bring them with me. And that's to make the obvious point — things did not go as well as the campaign had hoped, and obviously did not go as well as President Biden had hoped," he said.  Newsom — who has vehemently denied claims that he's running a "shadow campaign" to replace Biden — was among the 20 De...

Financial Times : SemiAnalysis: Nvidia is set to sell $12B worth of H20 chips in China in 2024, or 1M+ units; Huawei expects to sell ~550,000 units of Ascend 910B chips in 2024   —  Chipmaker set to surpass China sales by local rival Huawei by selling product designed to fall outside of export restrictions

White House chief of staff Jeff Zients reportedly held an all-staff meeting Wednesday to urge team members to tune out the "noise" and focus on the task of governing, as senior aides scramble to contain the political fallout from President Biden’s disastrous debate performance. Even as Zients acknowledged that the days since the Atlanta matchup between Biden and former President Trump have been challenging, the chief of staff stressed to White House aides the accomplishments and the track record of the Democratic administration and said governing will only become more crucial once the campaign season heats up, particularly after the Fourth of July holiday, The Associated Press reported, citing a White House official. Biden himself began making personal outreach on his own, speaking privately with senior Democratic lawmakers such as Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Delaware Sen. Chris Coons and South Carolina Rep. James Clyburn, ...

Rocky Swift / Reuters : Japan's government has finally eliminated the use of floppy disks in all its systems, after scrapping over 1,000 regulations governing their use   —  Japan's government has finally eliminated the use of floppy disks in all its systems, two decades since their heyday, reaching a long-awaited milestone …

Former White House press secretary Jen Psaki has agreed to sit down with House GOP investigators probing the Biden administration’s withdrawal from Afghanistan , Fox News Digital has learned. Psaki will appear for a closed-door transcribed interview with the House Foreign Affairs Committee on July 26 as part of the panel’s long-running probe into the chaotic August 2021 operation, according to a letter sent to the chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, the content of which was obtained by Fox News Digital.  White House deputy counsel Rachel Cotton wrote in the letter that the committee’s request to hear from Psaki "raises serious separation-of-powers and Executive Branch confidentiality issues." "Nevertheless, as an extraordinary accommodation, we will authorize Ms. Psaki to participate in a voluntary transcribed interview accompanied by personal counsel and the White House Counsel’s Office subject to appropriate terms and conditio...

In the Supreme Court's monumental decision in former President Trump's immunity case, one justice questioned whether Special Counsel Jack Smith – at the helm of Trump's unprecedented prosecution – was constitutionally appointed.  On Monday, a 6-3 majority ruled that a president has substantial immunity for official acts in office, and sent the case back down to lower courts to determine which acts at the center of Trump's case were official.  " The President is not above the law. But Congress may not criminalize the President’s conduct in carrying out the responsibilities of the Executive Branch under the Constitution. And the system of separated powers designed by the Framers has always demanded an energetic, independent Executive," the opinion said.  In a separate concurring opinion, Justice Clarence Thomas looked to "highlight another way in which this prosecution may violate our constitutional structure" – the appointment of Jack Smith as sp...

Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch : Meta changes its “Made with AI” label to “AI info”, to indicate images were not necessarily created with AI but that AI editing tools may have been used   —  After Meta started tagging photos with a “Made with AI” label in May, photographers complained …

A poll released by CBS News on Sunday found that more voters have doubts about President Biden's cognitive abilities after Thursday's presidential debate. The poll, which was conducted between Friday and Saturday, found that 18% of voters thought Biden's debate performance inspired confidence, while 44% believed that former President Trump's performance did. Only 21% of polled voters believed that Biden presented his ideas clearly. When asked earlier in June if Biden had the mental and cognitive health to serve as president, 35% of respondents said he did. After the debate, that number dropped to 27%. Sixty-five percent of polled voters said Biden did not have the mental and cognitive health to serve as president when asked on June 9. That number has increased to 72%. JILL BIDEN'S EX-HUSBAND CALLS HER OUT FOR DEFENDING 'STRUGGLING' JOE BIDEN, 'KEEPING HIM IN THE RACE' When the respondents were asked about President Trump's mental and cogni...

Former Harlem Congressman Charles Rangel — who is 94 years old — wondered whether President Biden belongs in a nursing home instead of the White House following last week’s debate disaster. "I have never been more shocked and embarrassed by any presidential debate than I was last Thursday," Rangel, who served in Congress from 1971 to 2017, said Sunday on 770 WABC radio’s "The Cats Roundtable."  "One [candidate is] a convicted felon who has no respect for the truth, for morality. The other seemed so damned confused I didn’t even know whether he knew where the hell he was at in terms of responding to the moderator." Rangel, a Democrat, told host John Catsimatidis he "would not object" to both candidates taking cognitive tests to determine their fitness. Trump is 78, just three years younger than Biden. FAUCI GIVES HIS OPINION ON WHETHER 81-YEAR-OLD BIDEN IS FIT TO RUN FOR A SECOND TERM "It’s clear that Biden was shaky in responding … ...

Should Sen. JD Vance get the nod from former President Trump to be his 2024 running mate and the ticket wins the White House in November, the Ohio Republican's Senate seat will be in the hands of a decidedly non-MAGA GOP governor. Trump is expected to make an announcement on his selection by mid-July, and Vance is widely believed to be on his short list. If Vance trades in his Senate seat for the vice presidency, Gov. Mike DeWine, a fellow Republican, will choose who gets to finish his term. Vance hopes it happens. "I care a lot about national defense, I care a lot about whether the troops have what they need to fight," Vance said on Fox News last week in a conversation related to him potentially serving as vice president. "I care a lot about, frankly, whether when we ask our kids to go to war, we ought to make sure it's for the right reasons. And so you definitely think about those things, maybe a little bit differently, as a U.S. Marine."  THE VEEPSTAK...

The Biden campaign sent out an email to supporters detailing how they can respond to their friends who are critical of President Biden’s debate performance. "If you’re like me, you’re getting lots of texts or calls from folks about the state of the race after Thursday," reads the email. "Maybe it was your panicked aunt, your MAGA uncle, or some self-important podcasters. It’s a tough position to be in, so I thought it might be helpful to send you a few responses." The email comes after last week’s first presidential debate between Biden and former President Trump , which resulted in widespread criticism of the president's performance. BIDEN DEBATE DEBACLE: 10 EYE-OPENING MEDIA RESPONSES, FROM MSNBC PANIC TO ‘THE VIEW’ CALLING FOR REPLACEMENT "This was a game-changing debate in the sense that right now, as we speak, there is a deep, a wide and a very aggressive panic in the Democratic Party. It started minutes into the debate and it continues right now,...