newsnation

John Gruber / Daring Fireball : A developer who had a one-day session with Swift Assist in late 2024 says its UI is complete but results were not very good, and it falls apart on complex tasks   —  In an item earlier this week observing that Swift Assist, the most ambitious Xcode-related Apple Intelligence feature shown at WWDC last year …

Francisco Rodrigues / CoinDesk : 21Shares plans to liquidate two actively managed bitcoin and ether futures ETFs, following $1.66B in outflows from US-listed spot bitcoin ETFs this month   —  The firm is liquidating its ARK 21Shares Active On-Chain Bitcoin Strategy ETF and ARK 21Shares Active Bitcoin Ethereum Strategy ETF amid the downturn.

President Donald Trump signed H.R. 1968, the Full-Year Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act, 2025, into law after it passed both the House and the Senate. The passage of the continuing resolution (CR), which was backed by Trump, officially stopped a potential government shutdown.  The CR extends the government’s budget through the end of September and was approved by a majority of Senate Republicans. Only Sen. Rand Paul, R-K.Y., voted against the bill. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer , D-N.Y., faced backlash on Friday from fellow Democrats after announcing his intention to vote for the bill. SHUTDOWN AVERTED AFTER SCHUMER CAVES AND BACKS TRUMP SPENDING BILL In total, 10 Democrats voted with Republicans to pass the CR and avert a government shutdown, including Schumer, Senate Minority Whip Dick Durban, D-Ill., and Sens. Angus King, I-Maine, Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., John Fetterman, D-Pa., Gary Peters, D-Mich., Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., Kir...

Richard Spencer / The Times : DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng has become a superstar in China with tourism around his origin story, as DeepSeek proves an unexpected boon for President Xi   —  An entire tourist industry has sprung up around the origin story of the man whose low-cost artificial intelligence model has taken the world by storm

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard announced a crackdown on leaks within the intelligence community. Gabbard — a former Democratic congresswoman turned Trump-supporting Republican — was sworn in to the DNI post last month. "Our nation’s Intelligence Community must be focused on our national security mission. Politically motivated leaks undermine our national security and the trust of the American people, and will not be tolerated," she declared on Friday in a thread on X TULSI GABBARD'S WARNING TO SENATE ON SYRIA PROVES PROPHETIC AS AL QAEDA-LINKED REGIME SLAUGHTERS MINORITIES "Unfortunately, such leaks have become commonplace with no investigation or accountability. That ends now. We know of and are aggressively pursuing recent leakers from within the Intelligence Community and will hold them accountable," Gabbard added. She then listed several "recent examples" of intelligence community leaks: GABBARD SAYS BIDEN ADMIN IGNORED ‘HI...

Senate Democrats are in disagreement over how to proceed on the House-passed stopgap spending bill to avert a government shutdown , with some inclined to help advance it and others apparently willing to risk a lapse in funding.  "They’ve been debating what to do, and there’s been people who feel strongly on both sides," a Democratic source familiar told Fox News Digital, in reference to several lengthy Senate Democratic caucus meetings in the past couple days.  The senators have remained tight-lipped about the content of the meetings.  SENATE REPUBLICANS COIN 'SCHUMER SHUTDOWN' AHEAD OF CRITICAL VOTE ON TRUMP SPENDING BILL As of Thursday afternoon, multiple lawmakers, including Sens. Mark Warner, D-Va ., and Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., posted videos to inform social media that they were voting against the short-term spending bill, or continuing resolution (CR).  "I've seen the videos that they're going to shut it down," Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa. ,...

President Donald Trump remains optimistic that the U.S. will acquire Greenland, despite the fact Greenland has said it’s not interested in becoming part of the U.S.  Trump’s remarks coincide with a visit from NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, who said that he didn’t want to "drag NATO" into negotiations about the U.S. acquiring the Danish territory . "I think it'll happen," Trump told reporters Thursday. "And I'm just thinking, I didn't give it much thought before, but I'm sitting with a man that could be very instrumental. You know, Mark, we need that for international security, not just security, international." Rutte said he didn’t want to weigh in on the matter. However, he agreed with Trump that the Chinese and Russians were active in shipping routes near Greenland and stressed that Arctic countries must work with the U.S. to preserve security in the region.  "But when it comes to the High North and the Arctic, you are total...

Kif Leswing / CNBC : Nvidia is expected to announce new GPUs, named after Vera Rubin, the female scientist who discovered dark matter, on March 18 at its annual GTC conference   —  Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is expected to reveal details about Rubin, the chipmaker's next AI graphics processor, on Tuesday at the company's annual GTC conference.

The social media reactions are pouring in after President Donald Trump took the driver's seat to support Elon Musk . Tesla's stock rebounded Tuesday after facing a steep decline to start the week amid the ongoing protests at Tesla showrooms across the country.  While Tesla stocks rose, Democrats looked down at Trump's latest charade – accusing him of running a Tesla ad at the White House .  "I’m sure all the people losing their retirement, jobs, and health care because of Trump are glad to see the White House turned into a car dealership for the richest man on the planet," DNC Chair Ken Martin said in an X post.  Fox News' Peter Doocy asked Trump about his message to Americans who are facing financial uncertainty and worried about their retirement accounts while the president was buying a new Tesla. Trump told Doocy he had to order foreign tariffs to boost the American economy.  TESLA REBOUNDS AFTER TRUMP DEFENDS MUSK, BRINGS EVS TO WHITE HOUSE "W...

Aisha Malik / TechCrunch : Snapchat introduces AI video Lenses, powered by Snap's in-house generative video model, available to subscribers of the $16/month Snapchat Platinum tier   —  Snapchat is introducing its first ever video generative AI Lenses, the company told TechCrunch exclusively.

The Defense Department effectively barred civilian employees from traveling or making taxpayer-funded purchases, according to new memos.  The spending limit on government-issued travel and purchase cards for federal civilian employees was reduced to $1, according to instructions posted on the Defense Department's website. "DoD civilian employees must cancel all future non-exempted official travel reservations, and those currently on non-exempted travel must return to their respective permanent duty stations as soon as feasible," the memo states. Civilian employee travel that directly supports military operations or a permanent change in station is exempted, according to one memo.  HEGSETH DIRECTS DOD CIVILIAN WORKFORCE TO COMPLY WITH MUSK’S DOGE PRODUCTIVITY EMAIL A parallel memo effectively froze civilian credit cards used to purchase anything from office supplies to items priced up to $10,000.  It came after a Feb. 26 executive order from President Donald ...

Matt Day / Bloomberg : After tech companies like Amazon and Microsoft made huge bets on AI, the gadget boom that started with the launch of Alexa in 2014 has largely fizzled   —  Amazon and Microsoft have pulled back on hardware, roiling the product design scene in Seattle and beyond. … Amazon isn't unusual in this regard.

Sen. Tim Kaine , D-Va., met with Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) employees on Friday who were fired as a result of Elon Musk’ s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) federal workforce reductions.  CFPB has provided over $21 billion in consumer relief, according to the agency's latest data from Dec. 3. 2024. Kaine accused Musk of targeting the CFPB with DOGE cuts for his own gain.  "The fact that the Trump administration would target these guys at the front end of a chainsaw massacre… Why are you going after these consumer protection advocates? It smells really bad. I mean, it makes it seem like it happened because Musk has some particular interest in gutting these regulators who are protecting everyday folks." In an interview with Fox News Digital following his meeting with former CFPB employees, Kaine said the CFPB saved "tens of thousands of Virginians" from unfair or abusive financial practices.  FEDERAL WORKERS' UNION FILES LAWSUITS ...

Janko Roettgers / Fast Company : How focusing on West Africa helped music streamer Audiomack grow alongside industry giants like Spotify; 50% of its 40M monthly listeners are from Africa   —  By focusing on rising stars from West Africa, Audiomack has been able to grow alongside much larger streaming music services.  —  Kendrick Lamar.

U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) Secretary Pete Hegseth said Sunday that his department "does not do climate change crap," but instead focuses on things like warfighting and training. The secretary was responding to a post from CNN’s Haley Britzky, who shared a story about the DOD and Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) cutting programs in the Pentagon that deal with climate change. "The DOD and DOGE have said they plan to cut climate programs in the Pentagon – but officials & experts are warning that climate efforts at DOD are directly linked to military readiness, and say cuts could put troops and military operations at risk," Britzky wrote. CNN reportedly reached out to the Pentagon with a list of questions about military readiness, Britzky added. DOGE INITIAL FINDINGS ON DEFENSE DEPARTMENT DEI SPENDING COULD SAVE $80M, AGENCY SAYS "...Pentagon Spox John Ullyot said ‘Climate zealotry and other woke chimeras of the Left are not part’ of DOD’s...

Failed Democratic Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams is facing condemnation from conservatives after she appeared on MSNBC to defend a $2 billion initiative under the Biden administration's EPA to purchase green energy appliances for Americans.  "Stacey Abrams linked Power Forward Communities received $2 billion in tax dollars in 2024 after reporting just $100 in revenue the year before. They were so unqualified that the grant agreement required the NGO to complete ‘How to Develop a Budget’ training within 90 days," EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in comment provided to Fox Digital on Sunday.  "$2 billion in hard earned tax dollars should not have been doled out to this organization for many reasons, especially if they don’t even know how to put together a budget. The Biden EPA ‘gold bars’ scheme is riddled with self-dealing and conflicts of interest, unnecessary middlemen, unqualified recipients, and massively reduced government oversight. The funds...

Sun Yu / Financial Times : Asset managers and investors say wealthy Chinese investors are using SPVs to quietly funnel tens of millions of dollars into Musk's xAI, Neuralink, and SpaceX   —  Asset managers have been promoting tech mogul's ties to Donald Trump to lure capital to xAI, Neuralink and SpaceX