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A Bernie Sanders -backed California congressional candidate who touts his career as an educator has used the classroom and academia to push diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives and activist groups, according to his own writings and reports on his work with students. Randy Villegas is taking on Republican Rep. David Valadao in California’s 22nd Congressional District in a high-stakes Central Valley showdown that could help determine control of the House . Democrats have made the seat a top pickup target as the nonpartisan Cook Political Report rates the district a "toss-up" and gives the district a razor-thin D+1 partisan lean. Villegas, a political science professor at College of the Sequoias and Visalia school board trustee, co-authored a 2022 academic paper arguing that DEI is central to the mission of community college educators and describing it as a "social justice-driven duty." The paper, titled "A Commitment to Teaching, Learning, and Stude...

Kieran Ramsey, the chief investigative officer for Global Reach, detailed the horrific conditions U.S. Marine veteran Robert Gilman experienced while wrongfully detained by Russia and urged the immediate release of five other Americans held in Russia in an interview with Fox News Digital. Ramsey, who worked with U.S. authorities to secure Gilman's release after 1,666 days in a Russian prison, praised President Donald Trump's efforts to secure Gilman's return on humanitarian grounds. "Mr. Gilman's home, no doubt, because of the leadership from President Trump. He made a full court press with his senior most team requesting that the Russians release him on a humanitarian basis, which is exactly what happened. And no doubt it was the work of some good, quiet diplomacy on the part of people like Steve Witkoff, his special envoy and Secretary Rubio, and even the CIA director was involved," Ramsey told Fox News Digital. Gilman was released to U.S. authorities on Tu...

The Information : Sources: Nvidia in talks to invest up to $3B in SoftBank-backed data center developer SB Energy that aims to IPO soon and is behind a huge OpenAI campus in Ohio   —  Nvidia is in talks to invest as much as $3 billion in SB Energy, the Softbank Group-backed developer of a massive planned Ohio …

Alix Coutures / The Information : Sources: Mercor and other firms gathering data for AI labs are driving demand to buy or license internal datasets from startups shutting down or being acquired   —  Eight days after AI agent startup Warmly in late June agreed to be acquired by HubSpot, CEO Maximus Greenwald found an unusual email in his inbox.

Kate Rooney / CNBC : Source: OpenAI CFO told investors that enterprise business now generates more revenue than ChatGPT-led consumer business; enterprise customers grew 32% in July   —  At the end of a week of turmoil in OpenAI's C-suite, finance chief Sarah Friar held a meeting with investors on Friday …

Joann Muller / Axios : Nevada granted Tesla a robotaxi permit, but capped the fleet at 10 vehicles, not 5,000 that Tesla sought, banned airport pickups, and ordered other restrictions   —  Tesla applied for a permit to deploy up to 5,000 robotaxis in Clark County, Nevada, but got approval from the state for just 10.

The suspect charged in the stabbing death of a California man in an otherwise quiet East Bay suburb has a history of prior arrests and originally entered the U.S. during the George W. Bush administration, according to records. Marcos Iriarte-Valdez, alternatively identified by DHS as Marcos Valdezusper, was arrested Friday at his home in Contra Costa County, California, after police said he stabbed and killed 68-year-old retiree Todd Stewart during an apparent burglary attempt. "The investigation is ongoing and our understanding of the incident may change as more individuals are interviewed and evidence is collected and analyzed," the Martinez Police Department said. Iriarte-Valdez was "legally admitted" to the U.S. in 2007, according to information provided by ICE. Fox News Digital reached out to the agency for further clarity on what happened between then and when he was deemed an "illegal alien" by DHS on X more recently. DEADLY HOSPITAL STABBING PUTS ...

Chris Welch / Bloomberg : US-based robot vacuum maker Matic rolls out a firmware update that lets users control its $1,245 vacuum with voice commands in more than 70 languages   —  The device, from Silicon Valley brand Matic, can be controlled fully by voice instructions, helping it stand apart from the competition.

Nearly a dozen people tied to a decade-long marriage fraud network allegedly involving more than 1,000 sham unions face federal charges related to a scheme that charged Chinese nationals up to $100,000 to participate in fake marriages to U.S. citizens in an effort to secure green cards, federal prosecutors said Wednesday. A federal indictment unsealed in New York City names 11 defendants — all naturalized U.S. citizens from China and one green card holder — for their roles in the marriage and immigration fraud scheme. They were charged with conspiracy to commit marriage fraud, immigration document fraud and conspiracy to encourage the unlawful residence of aliens in the United States, the Justice Department said. WOMAN EXPOSED RUNNING VISA FRAUD SCHEME SPANNING YEARS, POSING AS IMMIGRATION OFFICER The indictment is one of the largest marriage fraud prosecutions in the U.S., authorities said. "This scheme was not a quick fly-by-night operation, but rather a years-long, multimillio...

Kenrick Cai / Reuters : Sources detail moves behind Google's AI reshuffle; Sergey Brin urged key staff to go all in on Gemini, and some teams shifted from DeepMind to corporate Google   —  Google co-founder Sergey Brin in recent months has urged key AI staff to go all in on the company's Gemini model as parent Alphabet …

FIRST ON FOX: A Senate Republican leading a dive into Dr. Anthony Fauci’s old government iPhone alleged that "career bureaucrats" within Fauci’s old agency are sabotaging the senator’s and others’ quest for information from the pandemic era. Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., told Fox News Digital that he believed longtime employees of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) were putting up roadblocks to his own probe and other information trawling expeditions pushed by HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. "Again, we don't know what we don’t know," Johnson said. "We don't know what HHS has. Bobby Kennedy doesn't know what HHS has." FAUCI HELD IN CONTEMPT AS COVID CELLPHONE LANDS IN HANDS OF SENATE INVESTIGATORS Johnson, along with Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., received a copy of Fauci’s personal work phone from HHS as part of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee’s broader investigation into the former head of the National ...

The Information : Sources: David Sacks' Craft Ventures is targeting around $1B for a new fund, its first since Sacks stepped down as the White House AI and crypto czar   —  Craft Ventures, the VC firm helmed by former White House AI czar David Sacks, is raising its first fund since Sacks stepped away …

Isaiah Poritz / Bloomberg : The Ninth Circuit dismisses Meta's bid to pause a landmark trial by state AGs alleging its products addict children and have caused a youth mental health crisis   —  Meta Platforms Inc. failed to obtain an emergency order pausing a landmark trial slated to begin this week involving claims …

Conservatives online aren't willing to forgive and forget the destruction caused by woke activists over the past several years after Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez , D-N.Y., flippantly cast aside the behavior as a thing of the past. AOC, an original member of the so-called Squad of progressives elected to Congress in 2018, brushed off in a Sunday morning interview the first wave of 'woke,' which she helped champion. "You don't get to spend years pushing to fundamentally transform the country, divide it on racial lines, inject DEI into every institution, and then try to brush it off as a minor misunderstanding when your worldview turns out to be extremely unpopular with the American people," said Rep. Brandon Gill, R-Texas, on X in response to her comments. ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ SHRUGS OFF PAST 'DEFUND THE POLICE' COMMENTS, JOKING 'WOKE 1 WAS CRAZY' ABC "This Week' host Jonathan Karl briefly pressed the congresswoman, who is a member...

Aisha Malik / TechCrunch : YouTube says new creators will need double, or 8,000+, watch hours over the past year or 20M Shorts views in the last 90 days to start earning money from Feb. 1   —  YouTube announced on Monday that new creators will have to meet higher thresholds to begin earning money from ads and subscriptions.

Financial Times : Sources: Apollo, Blackstone, BlackRock, KKR, and other financial groups are partnering with Nvidia on a $500B funding package for AI infrastructure development   —  Apollo, Blackstone and Goldman Sachs are among groups working with chipmaker to raise capital for data centre boom

President Donald Trump escalated his criticism Sunday over the dismissed Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool vandalism case, pointing to a National Park Service employee’s account that former Olympian David Hearn "violently" ripped and tugged at the pool’s coating before authorities arrived. Trump shared a screenshot from court documents on Truth Social that detailed interviews with two National Park Service employees who were cleaning the interior of the Reflecting Pool when Hearn approached the area. According to the document, one employee, identified as W-1, said Hearn initially used his cellphone to take what the employee believed were photos or video of damage to the pool. WHITE HOUSE CONDEMNS 'TARGETED SABOTAGE' OF REFLECTING POOL AS REPAIRS PUSHED PAST JULY 4 CELEBRATION The employee then alleged Hearn "knelt, placed both hands into the reflecting pool, below the surface of the water, and started to ‘violently’ rip and tug at a large portion of the blue pool...

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez , D-N.Y., revealed that she is freezing her eggs, opening up about the deeply personal decision in a series of Instagram Story videos while saying the procedure will give her more control over her future and using the announcement to criticize the Trump administration's policies on women's reproductive health. The progressive "Squad" member posted the videos Saturday, explaining that she had spent years considering the procedure and saving for it before deciding to undergo fertility preservation. Ocasio-Cortez said she wanted to be open about the process because women are often not taught enough about their reproductive health or family-planning options. AOC SAYS MAHA ADVOCATES' FIGHT 'ISN'T PARTISAN' AS SHE BLASTS HEALTHCARE SYSTEM FOR FUELING 'A TON OF ANXIETY' "I have made the decision to start freezing my eggs," Ocasio-Cortez said. "I was weighing it for a very long time, and I think that I was s...

Shane Burke / The Information : US data center bans top 500, up from 300+ in late June, as New York and Texas join cities and counties pushing back against data center development   —  Local government resistance to data center development accelerated this summer, a warning sign for big AI companies such as Anthropic …

Financial Times : A look at Chinese state-owned investment bank CICC, which sponsored multibillion-dollar listings of China's tech champions, including CXMT and Zhongji Innolight   —  CICC has become a dominant financier in Beijing's drive to compete with US in tech race  —  China's top investment bank …