Today’s edition of quick hits.
* Trump’s statement on this appears to have wildly exaggerated the relevant details: “After President Donald Trump announced Thursday what U.S. and Board of Peace officials described as a pathway to a potential agreement that would disarm Hamas and other armed groups in Gaza, a senior White House official told MS NOW that public agreement from Israel is the next and final step to completing the deal.”
* The latest from Spain: “An estimated 50,000 to 60,000 migrants entered a small Spanish territory alongside Morocco on Thursday and Friday, according to Spanish authorities. Although at least 48,300 had returned to Morocco by Friday afternoon, the mass crossing prompted an immediate backlash from far-right politicians in Europe that seemed poised to linger.”
* I’m looking forward to hearing the explanation for the delay: “More than two days after the Senate narrowly confirmed Jay Clayton to serve as director of national intelligence, the senior federal prosecutor supported by Republican senators has not taken the oath of office, four U.S. officials told MS NOW on the condition of anonymity to describe internal discussions.”
* Does Carr see himself as the arbiter of what “public interest” means? “Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr on Friday defended his agency’s recent actions against ABC, saying broadcasters have a duty to ‘operate in the public interest’ and the FCC is merely trying to restore that standard.”
* Tactics like these seem to raise all sorts of difficult questions: “The Trump administration has a new tactic for trying to isolate cases of alleged voter fraud — digging into the IP addresses of those who went online to register to vote. The FBI recently obtained the IP address of someone who registered online in South Carolina, according to documents first shared with Axios.”
* I am yet to see anyone, anywhere make a coherent case as to how this helps Americans in any way: “The Department of Homeland Security alerted employers this week that it had officially ended humanitarian protections for about 350,000 Haitian immigrants, triggering mass layoffs that threaten to disrupt summer travel and destabilize an array of essential institutions and industries up and down the East Coast and across the Midwest.”
* An inherently silly demand that’s impossible to meet: “The Trump administration is in the middle of finding out that it’s very hard — maybe even impossible — to regulate perceived ‘wokeness’ in artificial intelligence. The government’s main procurement agency is a year into trying to translate President Donald Trump’s ban on ‘woke’ AI into contracting language, and technology companies are pouring out in opposition to what they’ve come up with.”
Have a safe weekend.
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