Who is racist???

 

Unlawfully retaliating..

Judge says Pete Hegseth is unlawfully retaliating against Sen. Mark Kelly over ‘illegal orders’ video

By Devan Cole

A federal judge on Thursday shut down Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s attempts to punish Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly over his urging of US service members to refuse illegal orders, ruling that the Pentagon chief’s actions were unconstitutionally retaliatory.

The decision landed two days after a grand jury in Washington, DC, declined to approve charges sought by federal prosecutors against the Arizona senator and several other Democratic lawmakers who taped a video last year warning that “threats to our Constitution” are coming “from right here at home,” and repeatedly implored service members and the intelligence community to “refuse illegal orders.”

Together, the grand jury declination and ruling from senior US District Judge Richard Leon represent major impediments to efforts by aides of President Donald Trump to use the levers of government to punish Kelly, a retired Navy captain and former astronaut, over his participation in the video.

Leon, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, wrote in a scathing, 29-page ruling that Hegseth was trampling over the First Amendment rights of Kelly and that his moves are an impermissible form of government retaliation.

“That Senator Kelly may be an ‘unusually staunch individual’ does not minimize his entitlement to be free from reprisal for exercising his First Amendment rights,” Leon wrote. “Senator Kelly was reprimanded for exercising his First Amendment right to speak on matters of public concern.”

The Pentagon, the judge wrote, was targeting “unquestionably protected speech” that is actually entitled to “special protection” under the law.

The decision is likely to be appealed by the Justice Department, which insists that Hegseth’s actions are unreviewable by federal courts or, at the very least, owed a great deal of deference by judges examining disputes like the one at hand.

Applauding Leon’s ruling Thursday, Kelly acknowledged in a statement that “this might not be over yet, because this President and this administration do not know how to admit when they’re wrong.”

“One thing is for sure: however hard the Trump administration may fight to punish me and silence others, I will fight ten times harder. This is too important,” the senator said.

Kelly’s case, brought last month, came just after Hegseth announced the Pentagon would pursue administrative action against the senator, including reducing his last military rank, which would lower the pay he receives as a retired Navy captain, and issuing a letter of censure.

Both Hegseth and Trump have publicly attacked Kelly over a video posted in November by the Arizona lawmaker – and five other Democrats with a history of military or intelligence service – urging service members not to obey unlawful orders that could be issued by the Trump administration.

“When viewed in totality, your pattern of conduct demonstrates specific intent to counsel servicemembers to refuse lawful orders. This pattern demonstrates that you were not providing abstract legal education about the duty to refuse patently illegal orders. You were specifically counseling servicemembers to refuse particular operations that you have characterized as illegal,” Hegseth wrote to Kelly last month in the censure letter.

Leon forcefully rejected Hegseth’s attempt to extend existing loopholes on First Amendment protections for active-duty service members to retirees such as Kelly, imploring the administration to “be grateful for the wisdom and expertise that retired servicemembers have brought to public discussions and debate on military matters in our Nation over the past 250 years.”

Citing a friend-of-the-court brief filed by former high-ranking military officials who warned that many service members are already declining to opine on matters of public importance out of fear of also being retaliated against, Leon called that reality “a troubling development in a free country!”

“Defendants’ argument runs up against our Nation’s long tradition of retired service members, including those holding elected office, routinely contributing to the public discourse in ways critical of current military policy,” he wrote.

Retribution campaign hits roadblocks

Leon is the latest federal judge to frustrate Trump’s efforts to go after his perceived political enemies. In several other cases, judges have stymied the president’s retribution crusade by killing criminal cases brought against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James and ruling against the president’s attempts to hamstring the work of Mark Zaid, a notable whistleblower attorney.

In the “illegal orders” video released in November, the lawmakers don’t specify which orders service members have received, or might receive, that could be illegal.

But it was posted as US military officials, including the commander of US Southern Command, and US allies, including the UK, questioned the legality of a series of military strikes targeting suspected drug traffickers in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific and as the Trump administration faced multiple court challenges to Trump’s decision last year to send scores of federalized state National Guard members to Democratic-led cities.

The video enraged Trump, who suggested the six lawmakers engaged in “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!”

Prosecutors from the US Attorney’s Office in DC reportedly pursued less serious charges when they presented their case to the grand jury on Tuesday.

Though it’s generally rare for grand juries to decline to approve charges sought by prosecutors, such rejections have occurred more frequently in recent months as the administration has pursued legally dubious cases. Prosecutors can try again to secure the indictments against the lawmakers.

Can't make this shit up... Insane!

Trump warns Canada over bridge, deal he says will eliminate hockey

Brett Rowland

President Donald Trump warned Canada over plans for a bridge and a deal with China that he says would eliminate ice hockey and the Stanley Cup in the latest trade tensions between the neighboring nations.

Trump threatened to hold up the opening of the Gordie Howe International Bridge connecting Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, saying the transit project was unfair. The bridge project has been underway for years and was expected to open early this year.

"Canada is building a massive bridge between Ontario and Michigan. They own both the Canada and the United States side and, of course, built it with virtually no U.S. content. President Barack Hussein Obama stupidly gave them a waiver so they could get around the BUY AMERICAN Act, and not use any American products, including our Steel," Trump wrote in a lengthy social media post on the topic. "Now, the Canadian Government expects me, as President of the United States, to PERMIT them to just 'take advantage of America!' What does the United States of America get — Absolutely NOTHING!"

Trump said he will begin talks on partial American ownership of the bridge project, which is operated by the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority, a not-for-profit Canadian Crown corporation that manages the bridge through a public-private partnership. Canada is paying for the project, estimated to cost $5.7 billion. The bridge is publicly owned by Canada and the state of Michigan. Canada plans to recover its up-front building costs from toll revenues over time.

"We will start negotiations, IMMEDIATELY. With all that we have given them, we should own, perhaps, at least one half of this asset," Trump wrote on social media. "The revenues generated because of the U.S. Market will be astronomical."

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said she plans to speak directly to Trump about the matter. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Tuesday the situation would be resolved after he spoke with Trump.

Trump also slammed Ontario for refusing to sell U.S.-made booze. The Liquor Control Board of Ontario banned the sale of U.S.-made products last year. Ontario Premier Doug Ford has said he'll keep the ban in place until Trump's tariffs are lifted.

Trump's more dire warnings came over a deal between Canada and China. In January, Carney and Chinese officials announced a deal to ease tariffs they had put on each other's products. China reduced tariffs on Canadian agricultural products, and Canada agreed to import 49,000 Chinese electric cars at a 6.1% tariff. The deal represents less than 3% of the new-vehicle market in Canada, according to the Prime Minister's office. However, Carney said it was a starting point.

At the time, Trump threatened Canada with 100% tariffs on imports. Trump said Monday that the future of Canada's most popular sport, ice hockey, is at stake.

"The first thing China will do is terminate ALL Ice Hockey being played in Canada, and permanently eliminate The Stanley Cup," Trump wrote on his social media platform.

Canada's economy is directly tied to the U.S. Most of its exports go to the U.S. Trump imposed 35% tariffs on Canadian goods in early 2025, except for products covered by the 2020 trade deal, the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement.

Those tariffs hit Canada's economy hard. Canadian exports dropped, business investment slowed, and tariff uncertainty dragged the nation's economy, according to a recent report from the International Monetary Fund. Carney has publicly pivoted away from the U.S. since early 2025, when Trump hit America's northern neighbor with tariffs over drugs and illegal immigration. Since then, Carney has discussed the "rupture" between the two neighbors and sought out deals with countries around the world, including China.

It has been a roller coaster ride for outgoing Canadian Ambassador to the U.S. Kirsten Hillman, who is leaving Washington this month after six years as Ottawa’s top envoy to the U.S.

Hillman, who assumed her post in 2020, recalled “hard” and “volatile” trade talks with the U.S. and Mexico during President Trump’s first term, but she said “we didn’t have any fundamental questioning of the fact that predictable and open trade among the three countries was good for America and with Canada and from Mexico.”

All parties seemed to agree that North American trade, Hillman said, “made American businesses more competitive and more prosperous and communities stronger.”

That sense of stability, however is “not the case today,” she said during an interview on Jan. 20 at the Canadian Embassy, from her office overlooking the Capitol.

“I think Canadians took for granted that a strong, predictable, open relationship with Canada based on a sort of mutual benefit would always be something that Americans not only believed in, but would kind of fight for, and I think that that is no longer the case. And I think Canadians have had a range of reactions to that, from sort of disbelief to anger to sadness,” Hillman said.

After returning to the White House last year, Trump imposed 25 percent tariffs on all Canadian goods, later raising them to 35 percent and then 45 percent in October. In March, shortly before his election, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said the old economic relationship between the U.S. and Canada was “over.”

After a friendly Oval Office visit in May that was all smiles and compliments, relations between Trump and Carney have quickly soured. The Canadian leader delivered a provocative speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last month, calling on “middle powers” to unite against global hegemony, prompting Trump to lash out with tariff threats.

Trump, in response, revoked Canada’s invitation to join his Board of Peace, potentially leaving it out of efforts to broker an end to fighting in Gaza and beyond.

He also threatened to punish Canada for trade deals with China that he initially encouraged, and Monday, he threatened to block the opening of a major bridge between Ontario and Michigan unless Carney meets a litany of trade demands, including easing high tariffs on milk and lifting limits on U.S. alcohol sales.

Despite Trump’s antagonism, Hillman said she remained optimistic the U.S. and Canada would eventually return to a stable economic relationship.

“Probably not without a certain amount of volatility or, you know, commentary, but I think we’ll get there and that the reason we’ll get there is because it’s what’s best for Americans, American workers, American companies, American communities, American jobs,” she said.

The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, a trade pact Hillman helped negotiate during Trump’s first term, is up for review this year. She noted how the deal had seen U.S. exports to Canada jump 20 percent.

“So I believe that in the end, the facts will govern the outcomes that we’re able to achieve,” she added.

However, Hillman conceded that among Canadian business leaders, “I don’t think there’s a sense that predictability is going to come back anytime soon.”

“Business leaders are telling me that they won’t go back, because … they won’t go back to putting too many eggs in one basket or expecting things to be as they always were, because they have come to realize that an administration can make changes, and that changes the entire business relationship that they have with the entire country,” she said.

The impact of Trump’s antagonism toward allies is also being felt in Canada’s security planning as Carney weighs the prudence of purchasing dozens of new F-35 fighter jets from the U.S.

During his speech at Davos, Carney said middle powers should both look inward to build stronger domestic economies while also diversifying trade relationships as a bulwark against undue reliance on major powers.

The forum would be both a platform and a testing ground for this new vision of a united middle power, as Canada and other NATO allies successfully pushed back on Trump’s threats to take Greenland by military force — forcing him to pull back on threatened sanctions against countries that sent forces to defend the island.

“[T]here are things that are being questioned today that haven’t been questioned before, and that is not just with Canada, but with allies around the world.” Hillman said.

Hillman insists the public tensions between leaders obscure a functioning relationship playing out between diplomats and trade representatives on both sides of the border.

“With the Trump administration, we do have very solid relationships in his team,” she said. “Doesn’t mean we agree with them all the time, but we have individuals who are responsive, who are willing to talk things through with us, who are willing to listen to the Canadian perspective.”

But Hillman conceded that there’s really one person who ultimately makes decisions in this administration: Trump.

“Our prime minister has a good relationship with President Trump, an open relationship with him, and we do have that at the cabinet level across almost every portfolio,” she said. “So that is essential, and that is helpful. It doesn’t solve every problem or concern or issue, but it is vital to do so, so that hasn’t changed.”

Carney told reporters in Canada on Tuesday that he spoke with Trump — both about the president’s threat to close the cross-border bridge and Tuesday afternoon’s Olympic women’s ice hockey game between the North American neighbors.

“This is a great example of cooperation between our countries,” Carney said of the bridge. “I’m not going into detail about those issues,” he continued, addressing the broader trade tensions between the U.S. and Canada.

The new point person for dealing with those problems will be Mark Wiseman, who, like Carney, has spent his career in the world of finance.

Hillman’s advice for her successor: “You have to get out of Washington.”

“America is a big, big place. Some of the most successful and personally gratifying times I’ve spent have been, in Texas, for example, in West Virginia. West Virginia is not Texas. Texas is not Washington state,” she said.

“You’ve got to get out there,” she added. “You’ve got to meet people. You’ve got to create connections. You’ve got to build alliances, not only for the purposes of advising the government, but for the purposes of having allies across the country.”

Why do we need this??????

These Billionaires Plan To Bring Self-Driving Tech To Everything That Moves

By Iain Martin, Alan Ohnsman

On a sunny winter day in Silicon Valley, Qasar Younis slips on his shoes in the entryway to Applied Intuition’s headquarters in Sunnyvale, California. The CEO’s strict ban on outside footwear in the building means employees and guests must wear slippers, a habit Younis picked up from a short stint at auto parts maker Bosch in Japan.

Feet now clad in black boots, he heads past a 150-foot water tower topped with what looks like a giant can of fruit cocktail—the last visible sign of the site’s roots as a Libby’s fruit cannery. His destination: the company’s garage, a tech warehouse in which you’ll find many of Applied’s latest experiments in car software.

Inside, a dozen or so young engineers who joined from companies like Honda, General Motors and Daimler line up next to various vehicles. Younis points to Jeep’s 2021 Grand Wagoneer, which is kitted out with its infotainment system, seating controls and vehicle diagnostics. Further down, there’s a robotic Isuzu box truck, currently being tested on Japanese highways. Nearby sits a small JCB Teleskid loader that can navigate construction sites on its own, and an autonomous Ford Raptor pickup, put together for the U.S. Army to haul gear without a soldier at the wheel.

Despite their differences, all these vehicles share software: Applied Intuition’s operating system, which Younis says can be used in any type of vehicle to connect and manage all its individual electronics and, increasingly, to drive itself. Founded in 2017, Applied sells the system mainly to traditional automakers like Stellantis, the successor company to Fiat and Chrysler, which inked a major deal in October. The pitch: Its tech will help them challenge next-gen players like Tesla, Google and Rivian, along with an emerging army of Chinese competitors that are turning cars into computers on wheels.

“Historically, [carmakers] acquire all these modules from suppliers for the braking system, the seats, and each one has a little software on it,” says Younis, a fast-talking Pakistani immigrant with a shaved head. “This is why they’re not like Tesla. They have to staple together five to eight different operating systems on a single vehicle, and you can’t do a single update.” Applied’s software, he says, “is the missing link to make cars and trucks and tanks intelligent.”

A one-stop tech shop is appealing for car manufacturers that have traditionally struggled with even the most basic software. Volkswagen, for instance, threw billions of dollars and thousands of engineers at an all-out effort to rival Tesla, only for the tech to be scrapped, the CEO to abruptly resign and the company left scrambling to integrate outsourced code. Even Ford and ever-reliable Toyota recalled over 2 million vehicles collectively last year to fix software glitches.

Applied booked around $800 million in revenue last year, twice as much as in 2024, while continuing to command gross margins of at least 80%. Top-tier investors BlackRock, Andreessen Horowitz and Kleiner Perkins love that growth and Younis’ vision (he’s “the best AI CEO nobody knows,” investor and board member Marc Andreessen recently posted on X). Last June, investors plowed an additional $600 million into the firm (it has raised $1.1 billion in all), pumping its valuation up to $15 billion. That means that Younis and his cofounder, Peter Ludwig, the company’s CTO, are worth at least $1.5 billion each, based on Forbes estimates of their stakes. Applied has been cash flow positive for “basically the whole history of the company,” Younis says.

Not content with making cars work better, Applied now wants to make them work by themselves. It already provides driver assistance as part of its operating system for autos, but Younis’ big bet is a single self-driving platform for everything that rolls, floats or flies, whether an F-150 pickup or an F-16 fighter jet. Its contracts now span the U.S. military, where it has $60 million in public deals with the Army and Air Force, as well as manufacturers that specialize in trucking, mining and construction equipment, like Komatsu and Swedish big rig powerhouse Scania. Ludwig claims that fully autonomous self-driving cars are just 18 months away, although a test drive shows Applied’s tech is still a bit rough around the edges.

“We have invested a huge amount in helping AI see, think and act. Now we can port that technology to all these different things,” Ludwig says. “Whether we’re talking about a car, a defense drone, a humanoid robot or an agriculture machine for farming.” That should help with the price, too—a single flexible system would cost less than sector-specific ones. Currently, Applied charges for its software on a per-vehicle basis. The specifics vary by contract, but a big manufacturer like Stellantis might pay more than $100 per car. Software for industrial vehicles, like mining trucks, is lower volume but more lucrative per vehicle.

Despite its excellent industry traction, Applied faces a range of competitors, including the likes of car software giant QNX. Tesla already has millions of cars on the road with driver-assist features that Elon Musk is itching to upgrade to full autonomous driving capability. And while Tesla lags Waymo in the robotaxi race, Musk’s tech is far more battle-tested than Applied’s. For now, Younis’ only self-driving client is Japan’s Isuzu, and some of his long-term customers like VW and Nissan are working with rivals Mobileye and Wayve instead.

But even if Applied’s software is ready in the next couple years, the combination of regulatory resistance and consumer caution means that self-driving cars on a mass scale are still far off. Instead, Younis is betting that bringing its autonomous software to spaces with more room for error will better position him to be able to win on self-driving cars too. Think mining haulers, farm combines or drone patrol boats, none of which need to worry too much about hitting pedestrians. It’s “radical pragmatism,” he says.

Younis and Ludwig grew up a few miles apart in the Detroit suburbs, where a nearby General Motors factory loomed large over their lives. Younis and his family emigrated from a farming village in Punjab, Pakistan, when he was in elementary school and his father landed a job in another local factory stamping out hoods and fenders. Ludwig’s father and grandfather, both GM men, discussed radar-based cruise control at the dinner table. “I probably took apart every electromechanical thing in the household to really understand how it worked,” Ludwig says.

The two never met as kids. Younis took the advice of his uncle, another GM veteran, and studied engineering at the “West Point of automotive”— Flint, Michigan’s General Motors Institute of Technology (now called Kettering University). He spent half his time learning about business, and the rest managing the V6 engine line. After his stint with Bosch car parts in Japan, Younis launched his first startup in 2007, a consumer crowdfunding business called Cameesa. It was a bust, but he struck gold with his second, TalkBin, a customer review app used by Crate & Barrel, that Google bought just five months after it launched (Younis netted a few million). He then joined the tech giant in April 2011 to work on Google Maps. A month later, he finally met Ludwig, who landed on his team after having studied engineering at the University of Michigan.

From Google HQ, the pair had a front row seat to the future of transportation. Just six months earlier, Google had unveiled the project that would become Waymo. “The natural extrapolation was, this is going to hit Detroit like a ton of bricks,” Younis says. “Like all good engineers in Silicon Valley, you think, ‘I should go do this myself.’ ”

Younis took his plan to Y Combinator’s Paul Graham. Instead of encouragement, he got a reality check. Robotaxis, starting a business and having his first child at the same time? Crazy. Instead, Graham convinced him to join the startup incubator in 2014, becoming chief operating officer, with Sam Altman (see “The Alchemist of AI,” page 60) as president. At Y Combinator Younis coached future unicorns DoorDash, Flexport, Gitlab and Cruise, the now-defunct self-driving car startup founded by Twitch’s Kyle Vogt.

When General Motors bought Cruise in 2016, Younis reached back out to Ludwig, who was still at Google. A significant shift was underway, he argued: “The car business is going to be a software business.” Google, Amazon and almost every carmaker in the world were now running self-driving experiments big and small. To capitalize on that, Younis and Ludwig decided to build simulation software— called “tooling,” it’s essentially a video game–like 3D world that can mimic millions of real-world situations—to test autonomous tech’s capabilities virtually.

They named their new outfit Applied Intuition and quickly landed deals with robotaxi startup Voyage (bought by GM’s Cruise in 2021) and self-driving truck company Kodiak, which now trades on the Nasdaq. “Tooling isn’t sexy, but it’s complicated and creates a lot of value right away,” says investor Bilal Zuberi, who led Lux Capital’s investment in Applied in 2017. Even today, it’s around a third of the company’s business, with major customers including GM and Toyota.

From there, Younis landed an early deal to build self-driving software for M1 Abrams tank maker General Dynamics. Now, later generations of the tech are being fitted to cars and trucks, with the operating system connecting everything from the brakes to seats to car computers. It acquired some of these capabilities by buying the intellectual property (and associated patents) of self-driving companies that went bust after running out of cash, such as autonomous truck developer Embark and OpenAI-backed Ghost Autonomy. “[Younis is] an execution machine like no other,” says Mamoon Hamid, managing partner at Kleiner Perkins, who first invested in 2019 and co-led last year’s $600 million round.

Today, some 1,300 people work at Applied on problems as mundane as Jeep’s lane guidance and as futuristic as U.S. Army robot trucks for combat. Younis doubled down on Applied’s military business with a 2025 acquisition of defense tech startup EpiSci, which helped make uncrewed F-16 fighter jets for the Air Force, and taught startup Aevex’s killer drones to fly in swarms. Applied’s tech garage even has a humanoid robot lurking in the corner (though Younis insists that’s not a big priority).

“They’re the most interesting company in autonomy,” says Grayson Brulte, founder of advisory firm the Road to Autonomy. “The fact that they can go across multiple verticals is huge. If one market goes into a recession, they’re not boxed in.”

On a bright December afternoon at an old gravel quarry in Sunol, California, about 25 miles from Applied’s office, a big construction excavator dumps a bucketful of dirt into the bed of a 40-ton yellow Komatsu truck. The truck drives hundreds of feet to a makeshift dump site, unloads and heads back to the excavator to do it all again, another dozen or so times before the day ends.

One day soon, there won’t be anyone behind the wheel. For now, there’s a safety driver, plus a team of four Applied engineers stationed in a small trailer nearby, glued to high-definition video and sensor feeds that monitor every movement in these simulated “LHD” cycles (load, haul, dump).

Automated trucks have been used at mining operations for many years in a limited manner, says Joe Forcash, who manages Applied’s automated industrials group and previously spent 25 years developing robotic vehicles for Caterpillar. But they aren’t perfect. “If anything gets in the way, vehicles don’t know how to go around it,” he says. Applied’s system promises to be able to pilot its machines around common obstacles such as boulders and Buick-sized potholes.

Building autonomous software for industrial trucks like this one is much easier than for vehicles that go on roads, where there might be random traffic cones, double-parked cop cars and texting pedestrians. Still, Isuzu, Japan’s commercial vehicle giant, is working with Applied on an autonomous delivery truck you might see heading crosstown as early as 2027, says Yasuhiro Yazawa, a general manager for Isuzu’s automated vehicle program. Initial testing of Applied’s system in Japan last fall showed promise—and problems. Merging and changing lanes still “need improvement,” he says.

Applied’s full self-driving tech for cars isn’t ready for prime time either, as a short test ride around Sunnyvale demonstrates. There are lags booting up the driving route and mild jitteriness similar to Tesla’s buggy “Full Self-Driving” system. Without public testing and scrutiny, there’s little outside technical analysis of just how good Applied’s platform is. At least for now, Stellantis, the world’s fourth-largest carmaker by volume, is holding off. Next year, Younis will earn a fee from every new Jeep or Peugeot rolling off Stellantis’ production line, but the deal to power the company’s “cabin intelligence” software doesn’t include any self-driving tech. “We will keep some autonomy development in-house,” says Stellantis CTO Ned Curic.

Company cheerleaders may think Applied’s all-in, autonomy-for-everything strategy is a good business hedge, but some critics say it’s a scattershot mess. “I think they’re in way over their heads, overpromising and chasing every latest shiny object,” says one industry veteran, who asked not to be named to speak freely.

If it does end up entering the self-driving car race, Applied faces a host of competitors beyond just Tesla and Waymo. Chip giant Nvidia announced in January that it’s building Tesla-like autonomous software, joining a field that includes companies such as Nuro, Mobileye and Motional. Another tough rival may be London-based Wayve, which similarly is developing all-purpose autonomous driving tech that can be used across a range of vehicles. “Our addressable market is every vehicle that moves,” says Wayve CEO Alex Kendall, who has raised $1.3 billion. Applied has lost one deal to Wayve already: Nissan, which uses its simulators to test driver assistance tech, decided to go with Wayve for its autonomy software. Younis says that Applied’s deal with the Japanese carmaker is “probably bigger.”

Thanks to its automotive operating system, its simulation business and a lead in automating “dull, dirty and dangerous” industrial vehicles, Applied has spread its bets wide. It’s a strategy that worked well in the last self-driving era, during which Applied thrived while many others failed. And there is no reason to suspect it won’t work again now, leaving Younis well-positioned to ride the autonomy wave, wherever it goes.

Detroit-Canada Bridge Saga

Trump Adds A New Chapter To Detroit-Canada Bridge Saga

By Bill Koenig

After decades, a new bridge between the United States and Canada is almost ready to open. This was supposed to end a decades-old soap opera.

U.S. President Donald Trump this week had other ideas.

On Feb. 9, in a post on Trump’s Truth Social, the president said he “will not allow this bridge to open until the United States is fully compensated for everything we have given them,” referring to Canada.

The Gordie Howe International Bridge, was constructed at a cost of C$6.4 billion ($4.6 billion). It will be the third crossing between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario. It will be added to a Detroit-Windsor tunnel (connecting the downtowns of the two cities) and the Ambassador Bridge, the main commercial link in the region.

The new bridge, named after a famed Detroit Red Wings hockey player, was built by Canada in part to make automotive trade between the two countries easier.

The new bridge has been developed for years.

The privately owned Ambassador Bridge opened in 1929, according to the Detroit Historical Society. It is the main point of U.S.-Canadian auto trade.

Throughout the early 2000s, the Ambassador Bridge owners conflicted with Canada.

The Ambassador Bridge owners sought to construct a new bridge next to the existing structure. The idea: The new bridge would take over trade while the old bridge could be used for emergencies. Detroit International Bridge Co., which owns the Ambassador Bridge, purchased houses and land for the replacement bridge, the company said in 2008.

Canada objected.

The country sought a new structure jointly funded with the state of Michigan. Eventually, Canada moved to finance a new bridge by itself. Tolls charged at the new bridge will be used to pay off costs. A deal was struck during Trump’s first term as president. The Gordie Howe bridge is about a mile away from the Ambassador Bridge.

The Prompt: Get the week’s biggest AI news on the buzziest companies and boldest breakthroughs, in your inbox.

The Gordie Howe bridge will connect Interstate 75 in Michigan to an extension of Canada’s busy 401 highway.

The new structure will “address some really important transportation needs,” Heather Grondin, chief relations officer of Canada’s Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority, said during a Society of Automotive Analysts webinar in August 2025.

Tolls for the Gordie Howe bridge have yet to be set. All tolls will be paid on the Canadian side of the bridge.

Grondin said in August the Gordie Howe bridge will be the choice for U.S.-Canada trade shipments.

All of this is taking place amid a U.S.-Canada trade war. Trump repeatedly has said the U.S. should annex Canada. The U.S. neighbor, an independent country since 1867, has resisted.

Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney have clashed repeatedly on trade matters. The U.S. president has objected to a trade deal Canada reached with China.

Former Michigan Gov. Rick Snyer, a Republican involved with the bridge deal, wrote an op-ed story this week for The Detroit News.

“Canada and the state of Michigan are 50/50 owners of the new bridge,” the former governor wrote. “Canada was wonderful and financed the entire bridge. They will get repaid with interest from the tolls. Michigan and the United States got their half-ownership with no investment. That is a great deal.”

Snyder added: “The workers and materials for the bridge construction have come from both countries. The U.S. customs plaza and the Michigan-side approach to work have been built with U.S. materials and workers, just as the Canadian equivalents have been built with Canadian resources.”

The New York Times reported Tuesday that Matthew Moroun, whose family owns the Ambassador Bridge, met with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Ludnick shortly before Trump threatened to prevent the opening of Gordie Howe bridge.

Bitch

5 takeaways from Pam Bondi’s fiery testimony

Analysis by Aaron Blake

Attorney General Pam Bondi’s testimony in front of the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday was some of the tensest and most combative testimony we’ve seen to date from a Trump Cabinet official.

Bondi came into the hearing with the administration and DOJ facing a series of problems, including their handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files, the newly reported failed indictments of six Democratic lawmakers, and the killing of two protesters by federal officers in Minneapolis last month.

Below are some takeaways from the hearing:

1. She had a combative — but dicey — Epstein strategy

Early in the hearing, Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington asked Epstein survivors in the audience to stand up. And she challenged Bondi on a difficult issue.

She asked Bondi, who had just apologized to the survivors for the abuse they suffered, to also apologize to them for the Justice Department’s failures to redact survivors’ sensitive personal information.

Bondi paused, as if considering her next move. Then, rather than apologize, she launched into a deflection about her predecessor as attorney general, Merrick Garland. The exchange quickly devolved into arguments and personal attacks.

It was a telling moment. The Justice Department has acknowledged these redaction failures. And the survivors are some of the most sympathetic figures imaginable. But Bondi decided the moment called for combativeness, not contrition.

The rest of the hearing flowed from there. Bondi was extremely combative throughout, doing whatever she could to avoid Democrats’ and GOP Rep. Thomas Massie’s questions about Epstein — in ways that might seem politically unwise.

She also refused Democrats’ repeated entreaties to address the survivors seated behind her — survivors who said DOJ had ignored them — which made for some compelling visuals.

She called a Democrat a “washed up, loser lawyer.” She berated another for attacking “the greatest president in American history,” Trump.

When Bondi claimed there was “no evidence that Donald Trump has committed a crime,” Democratic Rep. Ted Lieu of California pointed to an unsubstantiated tip about Trump from the Epstein files — something he said counts as evidence — and accused Bondi of lying under oath and called for her to resign. Bondi suggested the lawmaker should focus on “horrific crimes in California” instead.

And when another lawmaker urged her again to consider the survivors sitting nearby, rather than responding she pointed to the expired clock, saying, “Your time is up.”

She talked over her interrogators so much that Republican Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan had to repeatedly remind her that the time belonged to the members, not her.

It seemed Bondi was playing to the “audience of one” — Trump. But that came potentially at the expense of appealing to an American public that really does want answers.

A recent poll, after all, showed Americans disapprove about 3-to-1 of the administration’s handling of the Epstein files.

The combativeness was normal for Bondi, but it risked looking out of place and like she wasn’t taking a serious issue seriously.

So many Trump officials right now seem to be choosing between doing his bidding and doing what might otherwise seem wise. And Bondi’s performance Wednesday was a case in point.

2. Massie drew some blood in a key exchange

But Bondi couldn’t just go after Democrats. After all, some Republicans have pressed her and her department on this issue.

And an exchange with Massie, the lead Republican behind the Epstein files effort, stood out when it came to actually pinning down the administration.

The Kentuckian pointed to another big redactions issue: How the administration appeared to errantly redact some men whom law enforcement at one point appeared to suspect of criminal activity with Epstein. Massie and Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California have cited six of them, including billionaire business magnate Les Wexner.

(Wexner has not been accused of a crime, and a representative has said he cooperated with law enforcement and was told he “was neither a co-conspirator nor target in any respect.”)

Bondi noted, as the administration has, that Wexner’s name appeared elsewhere in the documents. But Massie referred to that as a red herring — that the Justice Department happened to redact his name specifically where it was linked to possible crimes.

Bondi then claimed he administration un-redacted Wexner’s name “within 40 minutes.” But Massie accurately noted that only came after he and Khanna had called it out.

“Within 40 minutes of me catching you red-handed,” Massie clarified.

Bondi went on to call Massie a “failed politician” and a “hypocrite.”

While Democrats tried to highlight the administration’s missteps on this issue, Bondi was often able to muddy the waters by avoiding the question and getting into shouting matches.

Massie’s exchange actually landed.

3. A reprieve from the nastiness

For a brief moment, the lawmakers were reminded of an issue that increasingly inflicts them all. And it brought about a rare moment of real comity.

Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell of California, who has often tussled with Trump-allied witnesses, instead focused on threats that he and his family have faced. After detailing them, he asked Bondi if they were still being investigated.

“I’m just asking for your help to protect life, because life is at risk with the environment we’re in right now,” Swalwell said.

Bondi responded: “They are being looked into, and I can give you more details on those. None of you should be threatened ever. None of your children should be threatened. None of your families should be threatened, and I will work with you.”

The exchange highlighted a sleeping giant of an issue — and one that lawmakers are often reluctant to talk about. But it’s an issue that clearly impacts both sides of the aisle. And for once there was some unity in purpose.

Of course, the two sides have also disagreed vehemently about who is more to blame for political violence — an issue that also came up at another point in the hearing.

4. The hearing pointed to the administration’s many problems.

The way these hearings usually work is that the witnesses’ allies on the committee try to guide things in a more favorable direction. So they’ll focus on issues that play to their strengths.

But those issues were hard to come by.

Some Republicans tried to focus on the Biden Justice Department having subpoenaed the call logs of congressional Republicans — which the GOP has compared to “spying” on them.

But the hearing literally came a day after we learned the Trump DOJ went a whole lot further with six congressional Democrats — actually trying and failing to indict them. These people were, yet again, people Trump suggested deserved to be prosecuted.

Bondi focused in her opening remarks on the idea of keeping people safe, citing significant declines in crime numbers. And Jordan in his opening statement focused on deportations.

But those too are issue that seem to have gotten away from the administration. An NBC News poll released earlier in the morning showed Trump’s disapproval on immigration spiking to 60%. And the administration is still dealing with the fallout from its agents having shot and killed Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minneapolis — situations which have also emerged as major liabilities for the administration.

It was the kind of hearing that could seemingly have used a strong performance, where Bondi directly addressed the issues at hand and tried to right the ship.

But Bondi didn’t come to answer tough questions. She came to survive the hearing.

5. A couple Bondi volleys didn’t land

Bondi, as she has before, came loaded for bear to hit back at lawmakers.

But the downside of that approach is that sometimes you can miss.

Early in the hearing, Bondi rather puzzlingly suggested Democrats on the committee should instead focus on how much the stock market has surged under Trump.

“The Dow is over 50,000 right now, the S&P at almost 7,000, and the NASDAQ smashing records, Americans’ 401(k)s and retirement savings are booming,” Bondi said. “That’s what we should be talking about.”

The stock market is not usually the purview of the Judiciary Committee, which a Democrat quickly pointed out.

Later in the hearing, she attacked Democratic Rep. Becca Balint of Vermont for having voted against a resolution involving antisemitism.

But Balint is actually the granddaughter of someone who died in the Holocaust.

Balint pointed that out while shouting at Bondi and imploring her, “Are you serious?” Then Balint stormed out of the hearing.

Refuses to Apologize

Pam Bondi Refuses to Apologize to Epstein Survivors

Officials failed to redact their names—and did little to address the harm.

Alex Nguyen

The House Judiciary Committee’s hearing on oversight of the Justice Department devolved into insults and chaos on Wednesday. One telling example: whether Attorney General Pam Bondi and the Trump administration would apologize to survivors who were named, unredacted, in the department’s Jeffrey Epstein investigation files.

Among the documents released late last month, the Justice Department exposed the names of dozens of survivors, including some who have not disclosed their identities publicly or were minors when they were abused by Epstein. Many survivors remain identifiable as a result of incomplete or missing redactions.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) asked Bondi whether she would “turn to them now and apologize for what your Department of Justice has put them through,” asking the survivors attending the hearing in person to stand up. 

“Why didn’t she ask Merrick Garland this twice when he sat in my chair?” Bondi said to Republican committee chair Rep. Jim Jordan as she and Jayapal talked over each other. “I’m not going to get in the gutter with her theatrics.” 

Jayapal wasn’t alone in bringing up how survivors have been hurt following years of abuse and inadequate investigation—and how they’ve been denied a voice in the department’s handling of the investigation and release of the files. 

Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) grilled Bondi along the same lines. “How many lives have been derailed because your department was either sloppy and incompetent or willfully trying to intimidate and punish these ladies coming forward?” he asked.

“Your time is up,” Bondi replied.

Bay of Rainbows

Dark, smooth regions that cover the Moon's familiar face are called by Latin names for oceans and seas. That naming convention is historical, though it may seem a little ironic to denizens of the space age who recognize the Moon as a mostly dry and airless world, and the smooth, dark areas as lava-flooded impact basins. For example, this telescopic lunar vista, looks over the expanse of the northwestern Mare Imbrium, or Sea of Rains and into the Sinus Iridum, the Bay of Rainbows. Ringed by the Jura Mountains (montes), the bay is about 250 kilometers across. Seen after local sunrise, the mountains form part of the Sinus Iridum impact crater wall. Their rugged sunlit arc is bounded at the top by Cape (promontorium) Laplace reaching nearly 3,000 meters above the bay's surface. At the bottom of the arc is Cape Heraclides, depicted by Giovanni Cassini in his 1679 telescope-based drawings mapping the moon, as a moon maiden seen in profile with long, flowing hair.

Personal data

Personal data is the new battleground for democracy

As the world’s leaders gather in Munich, I call on them to help build a better foundation for AI that embeds Western values and protects future generations.

By Frank H. McCourt Jr.

At the height of the Cold War, a man named Ewald-Heinrich von Kleist-Schmenzin convened the West’s leading security experts in Munich. As a World War II resistance fighter and member of the Stauffenberg circle, which had attempted to overthrow Hitler, his goal was simple: preventing World War III. And he dedicated the rest of his life to fostering open dialogue, sharing defense strategies and deescalating tensions.

Tomorrow, as global leaders gather at the annual Munich Security Conference once again, the threats they face are no less profound than they were some 60 years ago — though many of them are far less visible.

Yes, wars are raging across continents, alliances are being tested, and tensions are escalating across borders and oceans. However, I would wager that if von Kleist-Schmenzin were alive today, he would agree that the most consequential struggle of our time may not be unfolding on traditional battlefields at all. Instead, it’s unfolding in the digital realm, where control over personal data — over our digital personhood — is the central source of power and influence in the modern world.

When the World Wide Web was born, we were promised an era of democratic participation — a digital town square for a new millennium. What we have instead is something far darker: Predatory algorithms shredding civil society, warping truth and pitting neighbor against neighbor, while a handful of the world’s richest companies know more about us than any intelligence agency ever could.

Deep down, we all feel the absolute grip of the Internet on society. We feel it at the national level, as polarization and misinformation continue to fray our social fabric, upend elections and disrupt the world order. We feel it at our kitchen tables, as artificial intelligence bots and polarizing voices prey on the mental and social health of our children.

This crisis is no accident. It’s the world Big Tech has deliberately built.

From the moment Facebook introduced the “like” button, the Internet began its descent from a boundless repository of knowledge into a system optimized for rage, addiction and profit—one that rewards division and disregards truth.

The business model is quite straightforward: Algorithms are engineered to capture our attention and exploit it, rather than inform or connect us. And by the metric of stock price, this model has been wildly successful. Big Tech companies have amassed trillions of dollars in record time. And they’ve done so by accumulating the most valuable resource in human history — our personal data. Acquiring it through a surveillance apparatus that would make the Stasi blush.

Now, with the rise of AI, these same companies are selling us a new story — that of a brave new chapter for the Internet that is exponentially more powerful and ostensibly benevolent. Yet, the underlying logic remains the same. These systems are still designed to extract more data, exert more control, deepen manipulation, all at an even more unprecedented scale.

The threat has particularly escalated with the emergence of the “agentic web,” where autonomous AI systems are no longer confined to interpreting information but are empowered to act on it – often with minimal oversight and inadequate alignment safeguards. OpenClaw — an open-source autonomous AI assistant — reflects this rapid shift from consumption to delegation perfectly: Individuals are handing over sweeping permissions, enabling agents to interact and operate freely with other agents in real time, dramatically amplifying exposure to real-world harm, coordinated manipulation from bad actors and with even less human control.

And yet, those who raise concerns about this concentration of power and these security risks are quickly dismissed as anti-progress, or accused of ceding the future of AI to China.

If Ewald-Heinrich von Kleist-Schmenzin were alive today, he would agree that the most consequential struggle of our time may not be unfolding on traditional battlefields at all. | Rainer Jensen/DPA/AFP via Getty Images

Let’s be clear: We won’t beat China by becoming China. Autocratic algorithms, centralized power and mass surveillance are fundamentally incompatible with democracy. And were von Kleist-Schmenzin to look at today’s AI frameworks, he’d likely recognize them as far closer to the east of the Berlin Wall than the west.

To reverse that reality, we must build alternative systems that respect individual rights, return ownership and control of personal data to individuals, and align with democratic principles. The technologies shaping our lives need to be optimized to protect citizens, not endanger them.

Here’s the good news: This technology is already being built.

Around the world, leading technologists, universities, companies and governments are working to establish a new paradigm for AI — open-source, transparent systems governed by the public sector and civil society. My organization, Project Liberty, is part of this effort, grounded in a simple belief: We can, and must, build AI technology that’s in harmony with fundamental democratic values.

Such upgraded AI architecture is designed for human flourishing. It will give people a voice in how these platforms operate, real choices over how their data is used, and a stake in the economic value they create online. It will be paired with policy and governance frameworks that safeguard democracy, freedom and trust.

As the world’s leaders gather in Munich, I call on them to help build a better foundation for AI that embeds Western values and protects future generations. Let them consider the world von Kleist-Schmenzin sought to save, and join us on the front lines of democracy’s new battleground.

NATO deploys to Greenland

NATO deploys to Greenland to keep Trump onside

The alliance’s Arctic Sentry is mostly a rebranding exercise aimed at appeasing the U.S. president — in response to a largely exaggerated threat.

By Victor Jack

NATO is beefing up its Arctic presence in a move designed less to deter Russia than it is to deter Donald Trump.

As the alliance rushes to increase its activities in the Arctic ahead of a defense ministers’ summit in Brussels on Thursday, diplomats and experts said the effort is mostly a rebranding exercise aimed at mollifying the U.S. president — in response to a largely exaggerated threat.

POLITICO spoke to 13 NATO diplomats, alliance officials and military analysts, some of whom were granted anonymity to speak freely about sensitive matters. They pointed to a significant shift inside NATO toward the region thanks to intense U.S. pressure prompted by Trump's threats to annex the island, but one that is primarily driven by politics rather than immediate military necessity.

With NATO officially framing its new “Arctic Sentry” mission as critical, the diplomatic effort shows the intention by U.S. allies to keep Washington onside amid concerns that failing to appease Trump on Greenland could be disastrous. 

“In the face of Russia’s increased military activity and China’s growing interest in the high north it was crucial that we do more,” NATO chief Mark Rutte told reporters on Wednesday.

Trump's Greenland threat in January was a breaking point for many European countries, cementing their view of the U.S. as a permanently unreliable ally. The issue hangs over this weekend's Munich Security Conference, where U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio will meet with many allied leaders. 

Experts say any security fears are largely overblown, with NATO more than capable of handling Russia in the Arctic.

“I hope they will just rebrand some ongoing activity,” said Karsten Friis, a research professor and Arctic security expert at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. “If there’s a lot of manpower … especially if it’s in Greenland, then it will come up expensive.” 

“The threat is more hypothetical than real,” acknowledged one NATO diplomat, who added the initiative has a clear “symbolic and communications aspect to it.”

A Public First poll conducted for POLITICO across five countries found that a majority of people in the U.S., Canada, France, the U.K. and Germany said Trump was serious about his effort to take over Greenland, with most saying he was doing so to gain natural resources and to increase U.S. control of the Arctic. Only a minority felt he was motivated by any threat from Russia and China.

Idle threat

After repeatedly refusing to rule out the use of force to take Greenland, the U.S. president finally walked back his campaign to acquire the Danish territory last month. The climbdown was helped by a pledge from Rutte and allies that NATO would take Arctic security more seriously. 

But experts remain deeply skeptical about the military need for such a venture.

After repeatedly refusing to rule out the use of force to take Greenland, U.S. President Donald Trump finally walked back his campaign to acquire the Danish territory last month. | Shawn Thew/EPA

“I do not think that NATO has a capability gap in the Arctic … the United States has the ability to deploy its capabilities to Greenland to defend the alliance,” said Matthew Hickey, an analyst and former official at the U.S. government-affiliated Ted Stevens Center for Arctic Security Studies.

With the U.S. able to dispatch “thousands” of troops to Greenland from Alaska “within 12 to 24 hours” and experience operating in the region from its biannual Ice Exercises, “it’s really more of a communication gap,” he said.

Washington has cited various future threats to the Arctic island: Moscow's outsized icebreaker fleet and its hypersonic missiles that could one day fly over Greenland undetected, growing Russian and Chinese collaboration and thawing sea ice opening up new shipping routes for suspicious vessels. 

But in practice, “the threat hasn't changed since the Cold War,” said Friis, the professor. 

The U.S. can easily upgrade its early-warning missile radar system in Greenland, he argued, while melting ice will only boost the very marginal commercial shipping route in the Northern Sea Route near Russia — nowhere near Greenland. Icebreakers have few military uses and and are easy to track, Friis added.

Chinese and Russian collaboration in the Arctic, meanwhile, will remain “largely symbolic,” said Marc Lanteigne, a political science professor and China expert at the Arctic University of Norway, as Moscow is “nervous” of Beijing's long-term designs on the region and is unlikely to grant it extended access.

If there is a threat, it’s in the European Arctic. There, Russia’s Northern Fleet based in the Kola Peninsula includes six operational nuclear-armed submarines, according to Ståle Ulriksen, a university lecturer at the Royal Norwegian Naval Academy.

Even so, Russia is “significantly outmatched” by NATO, said Sidharth Kaushal, a senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute think tank.

Since its full-scale war against Ukraine, Moscow has lost two of the three brigades that had been stationed in the far north, with their replacements expected to take “half a decade or more” to train. Meanwhile, Norway, Germany, Denmark and the U.K. are all buying Boeing P-8 maritime patrol aircraft to better surveil the region. Sweden and Finland both joined NATO as a result of Russia's war, further beefing up the alliance's Arctic muscle.

As a result, an additional Arctic mission focused on Greenland looks “a bit pointless,” said Ulriksen, the military expert.

However, the official alliance line is that this is a needed force projection. A NATO official told POLITICO the initiative “will further strengthen NATO’s posture in the Arctic,” including with joint exercises  “involving tens of thousands of personnel and the equipment ... to operate successfully in Arctic conditions.”

Polar problems

Initially, the Arctic Sentry mission will bring existing exercises such as the Danish-led Arctic Endurance in Greenland under the auspices of NATO’s Joint Command in Virginia. Eventually, it could mean dispatching planes and maritime patrols, according to two NATO diplomats, or setting up a permanent command.

Inside the alliance, the thinking is also that the mission could provide an early-warning signal to Russia and China to stay clear of Greenland in future, the NATO diplomats said, in particular if the Arctic island decides to become independent, and then decides to leave NATO (something its leaders insist won't happen).

“If Greenland were to become independent, you have … a country [that] would become therefore outside of NATO and could be subject to influence from our adversaries,” U.S. Ambassador to NATO Matthew Whitaker said Tuesday.

An alliance mission should therefore “make sure we know who is there and or who is transiting through there,” he told POLITICO.

In fact, some further measures could be helpful, said Kaushal, the naval analyst, deploying more unmanned surface vessels to keep track of Russian submarines and filling the shortage of sonar operators at sea.

But a standing maritime presence in the Arctic would be “entirely superfluous” and even dangerous, Kaushal said. “That places vessels potentially in very difficult climates near Russian-held territory, where the only support infrastructure is Russian.”

The U.S. currently has about 150 troops at the Pituffik Space Base in northern Greenland. Both Denmark and Greenland have stressed they are open to the U.S. stationing more forces on the island under existing arrangements.

However, basing more troops in Greenland would be wasteful, according to Rose Gottemoeller, a former NATO deputy secretary-general and U.S. under secretary of defense. “Permanent deployments are expensive and not warranted by the current circumstances.”

Nevertheless, for some allies, forking out cash and equipment is a fair trade to prevent the alliance from collapsing. “Perhaps it’s not … the best way to use the limited resources we have,” said a fourth NATO diplomat, but “letting the alliance disintegrate is the alternative.”

“If the price to pay is sending two ships to Greenland and 500 troops to do occasional joint exercises, then perhaps it’s worth it.”