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  • EU Hits Pause on US Trade Deal as It Seeks Clarity Over Latest Trump Maneuver

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    FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — Frustrated European officials pushed Monday for clarification on how U.S. President Donald Trump’s declaration of a 15% global tax on imports would affect the trade deal they struck with Trump this summer as EU legislators hit pause on the deal’s ratification until they get clarity.

    The European Parliament’s trade committee postponed a committee vote on ratification after Trump said he would impose the new tariff, after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down his use of an emergency powers law to set new import taxes. Trump then turned to another section of trade law to justify his imposition of the 15% global rate, which take effect Tuesday.

    The EU position is expressed in five words: “A deal is a deal,” said commission spokesman Olof Gill. “So now we are simply saying to the US, it is up to you to clearly show to us what path you are taking to honor the agreement.”

    The US-EU deal called for a 15% cap on tariffs on most European goods imports, while tariffs on US industrial goods would be lowered to zero. While the deal burdened consumers and businesses with a tariff increase from the previous average of 4.8%, it also gave businesses certainty so they could plan – a factor credited with helping Europe avoid a recession last year.

    Since the new 15% rate announced Saturday would be applied on top of the previous tariffs, it would break the agreed ceiling on tariffs, said Bernd Lange, chair of the parliament’s trade committee. Legislators postponed a committee vote on the agreement scheduled for Tuesday.

    Questions surrounded other trade deals done with individual countries including Brazil, India and Britain. For instance, Britain agreed a 10% maximum tariff with the US, while India settled on 18% and Vietnam accepted 20%. Although the Supreme Court decision did not directly affect bilateral deals, they were negotiated using threats of imposing the now-invalidated tariffs as leverage. However re-opening those deals could backfire because Trump has made clear he will pursue tariffs under other laws than the one the Supreme Court said he could not apply.

    US Trade Representative Jamison Greer said Sunday on US network CBS’ “Face the Nation” program that the administration had made clear to negotiating partners that Trump was intent on tariffs whether the Supreme Court ruled against him or not, that “whether we won or lost, there were going to be tariffs.”

    He said that the bilateral deals “are good deals, we expect to stand by them, we expect our partners to stand by them.”

    Moving from country-specific tariffs to the flat 15% global tariff “will have considerable implications elsewhere,” said Atakan Bakiskan, US economist at Berenberg bank. The new tariff means a reduced rate for some countries, for example Brazil, which faces a reduction of nearly 15 percentage points and China, which sees a reduction of nearly 10 percentage points.

    Under the law Trump relied on, these latest tariffs are in effect for only 150 days unless Congress votes to extend them. Trump could use that time to search for other legal provisions that would support his actions.

    While uncertainty hits European companies, it puts pressure on the U.S. economy as well, where consumers and companies pay the tariffs on goods purchased from abroad. “Uncertainty around trade policy appears here to stay – putting continued pressure on the US economy,” Bakiskan said.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Supreme Court Decision Against Trump’s Tariffs Raises Uncertainty, but Markets Stay Calm

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    BANGKOK (AP) — The Supreme Court’s ruling against U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs has countries like China and South Korea watching for Washington’s next steps, while financial markets took the news in stride.

    The decision announced Friday could potentially disrupt arrangements worked out in trade negotiations since Trump announced sweeping tariffs on dozens of countries in April 2025.

    China’s Commerce Ministry said it was conducting a “comprehensive assessment of ” the ruling against the tariffs Trump imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA.

    “China urges the United States to lift the unilateral tariffs imposed on trading partners,” an unnamed ministry spokesman said in a statement.

    The statement reiterated Beijing’s stance that there are no winners in a trade war and that the measures Trump had announced “not only violate international economic and trade rules but also contravene domestic laws of the United States, and are not in the interests of any party,” the official Xinhua News Agency cited the spokesperson as saying.

    Trump responded to the Supreme Court decision by proposing a new 10% global tariff under an alternative law, Section 122 of the 1974 Trade Act, and later increased it to 15%.

    For China and some other countries in Asia that were subject to higher import duties on their exports, that could potentially bring some relief. But for others such as Japan, the United Kingdom and other U.S. allies, tariffs could rise.

    The U.S. plans to stand by its trade deals and expects its partners to do the same, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said in a CBS News interview Sunday.

    “The deals were not premised on whether or not the emergency tariff litigation would rise or fall,” said Greer, Trump’s top trade negotiator. “I haven’t heard anyone yet come to me and say the deal’s off. They want to see how this plays out.”

    Uncertainty may worsen if the Trump administration continues imposing new tariffs under alternative laws, South Korea’s trade minister, Kim Jung-kwan, said Monday.

    The South Koreans have agreed to hold “amicable” discussions with U.S. officials in order to minimize any negative impact on South Korean companies, he said. Major South Korean exports such as autos and steel are subject to tariffs under other trade laws.

    “Given the uncertainty over future U.S. tariff measures, the public and private sectors must work together to strengthen our companies’ export competitiveness and diversify their markets,” Kim said.

    U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent also said Sunday that he believed trading partners would abide by existing deals and that tariff revenues will remain steady.

    “Tariff revenues will be unchanged this year and will be unchanged in the future,” Bessent said in a Fox News interview, pointing to the new 15% global tariffs Trump has said he wants as a replacement.

    The administration would defer to the courts on whether to give companies refunds for the import taxes already collected under the tariffs now declared unlawful, Bessent said.

    “It’s out of our hands and we will follow the court’s orders,” he said.

    U.S. futures sank early Monday, with the contract for the S&P 500 down 0.6% and that for the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling 0.5%. Oil prices fell and the U.S. dollar weakened against the Japanese yen and the euro.

    But share prices in Asia mostly advanced, with Hong Kong’s Hang Seng gaining 2.4%.

    Kim Tong-hyung in Seoul, South Korea, contributed.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Hungary Says It Will Block a Key EU Loan to Ukraine Until Russian Oil Shipments Resume

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    BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) — Hungary will block a planned 90-billion-euro ($106-billion) European Union loan to Ukraine until the flow of Russian oil through the Druzhba pipeline resumes, Hungary’s foreign minister said.

    Russian oil shipments to Hungary and Slovakia have been interrupted since Jan. 27, after Ukrainian officials said a Russian drone attack damaged the Druzhba pipeline, which carries Russian crude across Ukrainian territory and into Central Europe.

    Hungary and Slovakia, which have both received a temporary exemption from an EU policy prohibiting imports of Russian oil, have accused Ukraine — without providing evidence — of deliberately holding up supplies.

    In a video posted on social media Friday evening, Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó accused Ukraine of “blackmailing” Hungary by failing to restart oil shipments. He said his government would block a massive interest-free loan the EU approved in December to help Kyiv to meet its military and economic needs for the next two years.

    “We will not give in to this blackmail. We do not support Ukraine’s war, we will not pay for it,” Szijjártó said. “As long as Ukraine blocks the resumption of oil supplies to Hungary, Hungary will block European Union decisions that are important and favorable for Ukraine.”

    Hungary’s decision to block the key funding for Ukraine came two days after it suspended shipments of diesel to its embattled neighbor until oil flows through the Druzhba were resumed, and only days before the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion.

    Nearly every country in Europe has significantly reduced or entirely ceased Russian energy imports since Moscow launched its war in Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022. Yet Hungary — an EU and NATO member — has maintained and even increased its supply of Russian oil and gas.

    Hungary’s nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has long argued Russian fossil fuels are indispensable for its economy and that switching to energy sourced from elsewhere would cause an immediate economic collapse — an argument some experts dispute.

    Widely seen as the Kremlin’s biggest advocate in the EU, Orbán has vigorously opposed the bloc’s efforts to sanction Moscow over its invasion, and blasted attempts to hit Russia’s energy revenues that help finance the war. His government has frequently threatened to veto EU efforts to assist Ukraine.

    Not all of the EU’s 27 countries agreed to take part in the 90-billion-euro loan package for Ukraine. Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic opposed the plan, but a deal was reached in which they did not block the loan and were promised protection from any financial fallout.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • US Economy Grows at 1.4% Rate in the Fourth Quarter, Slower Than Economists Expected

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — America’s gross domestic product — the nation’s output of goods and services — increased at an 1.4% annual rate in the fourth quarter, the Commerce Department reported Friday, down from 4.4% in the July-September quarter and 3.8% in the quarter before that.

    A downturn in government and consumer spending contributed to the slowdown in fourth-quarter growth, the government said. Consumer spending rose just 2.2%, a significant slowdown from the third quarter’s healthy 3.5% gain.

    The report underscores an odd aspect of the U.S. economy: It is growing steadily, but without creating many jobs. Growth was a fairly healthy 2.2% in 2025, yet a government report last week showed that employers added less than 200,000 jobs last year — the fewest since COVID struck in 2020.

    Economists point to several possible reasons for the gap: The Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration has sharply slowed population growth, reducing the number of people available to take jobs. It’s one reason that the unemployment rate rose only slightly — to 4.3% from 4% — last year, even with the nearly non-existent hiring.

    Some businesses may also be holding back on adding jobs out of uncertainty about whether artificial intelligence will enable them to produce more without finding new employees. And the cost of tariffs has reduced many companies’ profits, possibly leading them to cut back on hiring.

    The economy is also unusual right now because growth is solid, inflation has slowed a bit, and unemployment is low, but surveys show that Americans are generally gloomy about the economy. In January, a measure of consumer confidence fell to its lowest level since 2014, yet consumers have kept spending, propelling growth.

    Some of that spending may be disproportionately driven by upper-income consumers, in a phenomenon known as the “K-shaped” economy. Yet data from many large banks suggests lower-income consumers are still raising their spending, even if by not as much.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Amazon Scraps Partnership With Surveillance Company After Super Bowl Ad Backlash

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    Amazon’s smart doorbell maker Ring has terminated a partnership with police surveillance tech company Flock Safety.

    The announcement follows a backlash that erupted after 30-second Ring ad that aired during the Super Bowl featuring a lost dog that is found through a network of cameras, sparking fears of a dystopian surveillance society.

    But that feature, called Search Party, was not related to Flock. And Ring’s announcement doesn’t cite the ad as a reason for the “joint decision” for the cancellation.

    Ring and Flock said last year they were planning on working together to give Ring camera owners the option to share their video footage in response to law enforcement requests made through a Ring feature known as Community Requests.

    “Following a comprehensive review, we determined the planned Flock Safety integration would require significantly more time and resources than anticipated,” Ring’s statement said.

    “The integration never launched, so no Ring customer videos were ever sent to Flock Safety.”

    In Super Bowl ad, a lost dog is found with Ring’s Search Party feature, which the company says can “reunite lost dogs with their families and track wildfires threatening your community.” The clip depicts the dog being tracked by cameras throughout a neighborhood on using artificial intelligence.

    And viewers took to social media to criticize it for being sinister, leaving many wondering if it would be used to track humans and saying they would turn the feature off.

    The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit that focus on civil liberties related to digital technology, said this week that Americans should feel unsettled over the potential loss of privacy.

    “Amazon Ring already integrates biometric identification, like face recognition, into its products via features like “Familiar Faces,” which depends on scanning the faces of those in sight of the camera and matching it against a list of pre-saved, pre-approved faces,” the Foundation wrote Tuesday. “It doesn’t take much to imagine Ring eventually combining these two features: face recognition and neighborhood searches.”

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Trump Administration Reaches a Trade Deal to Lower Taiwan’s Tariff Barriers

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration reached a trade deal with Taiwan on Thursday, with Taiwan agreeing to remove or reduce 99% of its tariff barriers, the office of the U.S. Trade Representative said.

    The agreement comes as the U.S. remains reliant on Taiwan for its production of computer chips, the exporting of which contributed to a trade imbalance of nearly $127 billion during the first 11 months of 2025, according to the Census Bureau.

    Taiwan’s exports to the U.S. will be taxed at a 15% rate or the U.S. government’s “Most Favored Nation” rate, the USTR’s office said.

    Trade Representative Jamieson Greer attended the signing of the reciprocal agreement, which occurred under the auspices of the American Institute in Taiwan and the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in the United States. Taiwan’s Vice Premier Li-chiun Cheng and its government minister Jen-ni Yang also attended the signing.

    The deal comes ahead of President Donald Trump’s planned visit to China in April and suggests a deepening economic relationship between the U.S. and Taiwan.

    Taiwan is a self-ruled democracy that China claims as its own territory, to be annexed by force if necessary. Beijing prohibits all countries it has diplomatic relations with — including the U.S. — from having formal ties with Taipei.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • A Glimmer of Hope for Democracy in Venezuela as Opponents Test the Limits of Free Speech

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    CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Andrés Velásquez didn’t stick around to become one more government critic jailed after Venezuela’s 2024 presidential election.

    A former governor who had crisscrossed Venezuela stumping for then-President Nicolás Maduro’s opponent in the disputed race, he grew a thick beard, sent his children into exile and avoided public events that could expose him to arrest.

    But in the aftermath of Maduro’s overthrow by the U.S., he mustered the courage to speak out. First, on Jan. 19, Velásquez, with his new look, appeared in a video in which he expressed support for Maduro’s removal while calling for new elections. Then, a few days later, he stuck his neck out even further, shooting a short video outside the infamous Helicoide prison in the capital, Caracas, to demand the release of all political prisoners.

    “We must dismantle the entire repressive apparatus in the hands of the state,” Velásquez said in the video. “Venezuela will be free!”

    Velásquez isn’t alone. Since Maduro’s ouster, a number of prominent critics have started to emerge from hiding to test the limits of political speech after years of self-imposed silence driven by fear. Regular Venezuelans are also throwing off restraint, with families of jailed activists protesting outside prisons and those freed defying gag orders normally imposed as a condition for release. Meanwhile, media outlets have begun re-opening their airwaves to critical voices banished in recent years.

    The political liberalization, while still incipient, was likened by Velásquez to glasnost, referring to the era of reforms and freer public debate that preceded the collapse of the Soviet Union. But unlike that and other democratic openings, this one is taking place almost entirely under the tutelage of the Trump administration, which has used a combination of financial incentives and threats of additional military strikes to carry out the president’s seemingly improbable pledge to “run” Venezuela from Washington.

    Last week, Rodríguez, a longtime Maduro ally, announced plans for a general amnesty that could lead to the release of hundreds of opposition leaders, journalists and human rights activists detained for political reasons. She also announced the shutdown of Helicoide, vowing to transform the spiral-shaped building — a futuristic architectural icon transfigured into a symbol of Maduro’s dungeons — into a sports and cultural complex for police and residents of surrounding hillside slums.

    “May this law serve to heal the wounds left by the political confrontation fueled by violence and extremism,” she said at an event surrounded by ruling-party stalwarts.

    Pedro Vaca, the top freedom of expression expert for the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the region’s most respected rights watchdog, said the few “breadcrumbs” offered by Rodríguez’s administration are no substitute for an independent judiciary and law enforcement.

    “Venezuela’s civic space is still a desert,” said Vaca, who has been trying for months to secure permission from Venezuelan officials to lead an on-the-ground assessment mission to the country. “The few critical voices emerging are seeds breaking through hardened ground, surviving not because freedom exists, but because repression has loosened while remaining ever-present. Let us be clear: this does not mark a democratic turning point.”


    Self-censorship deepens after 2024 election

    Political pluralism was severely eroded in Venezuela after Maduro took over the presidency from the late Hugo Chávez in 2013. Anti-government protests and episodes of civil unrest were regularly crushed by security forces whose loyalty to the self-proclaimed socialist leader proved unflinching if powerless against a far-superior U.S. military.

    The self-censorship deepened following the July 2024 elections, when Maduro launched a wave of repression marked by thousands of arbitrary detentions as he disavowed evidence showing he had lost the contested ballot to the opposition candidate, Edmundo González, by a more than two-to-one margin.

    Dissidents went into hiding, and the few remaining independent news outlets softened their already cautious coverage for fear of being unplugged.

    In an interview with the AP, Velásquez said he will continue to push the envelope of allowed political activity but remains wary because the state’s repressive apparatus continues to be entirely under the control of Rodríguez and her allies.

    “We must continue winning back lost terrain, challenging power. An opportunity has opened up and we can’t let it close again,” he said. “But the biggest obstacle we have to overcome is fear.”

    In the coming weeks, he’s looking to organize a public event with other government opponents who have recently come out of hiding. Among them is Delsa Solórzano, a former lawmaker who was also a fixture of the opposition’s 2024 presidential campaign. Solórzano last week resurfaced publicly at a rare press conference for her party, describing with tears how she had to take Vitamin D to compensate for the lack of sunlight while living clandestinely.

    “I didn’t hide because I committed any crime but because here fighting for freedom became an extremely high risk — to your life, your freedom and your safety,” Solórzano said.


    Rodriguez allies resist political liberalization

    Media outlets have also started flexing more muscle.

    Venevision, which like most private networks dropped coverage critical of the government in recent years, has reopened its airwaves to anti-government voices, covering opposition leader Maria Corina Machado’s every move in Washington since Maduro’s capture.

    Meanwhile, Globovision, the nation’s largest private broadcaster, whose owner is sanctioned by the U.S. for his ties to Maduro, invited back prominent commentator Vladimir Villegas for the first time in years.

    Villegas earned a reputation for deftly navigating Venezuela’s already restricted airwaves by keeping the government’s most hardened opponents off his influential political talk show. But the show was abruptly canceled in 2020 when Villegas criticized Maduro for forcing DirecTV to carry state TV in violation of U.S. sanctions, a move that forced the satellite TV provider — and its assortment of international news outlets — to abandon the country.

    Rodríguez herself hasn’t embraced meaningful public debate of the nation’s problems other than announcing the creation of an advisory commission on political co-existence to be headed by Villegas’ brother, Culture Minister Ernesto Villegas.

    But already some of her allies seem intent on shutting down any criticism. Meanwhile, authorities have yet to restore full access to the social media platform X, which Maduro blocked after its billionaire owner, Elon Musk, accused him of stealing the 2024 vote.

    In response to Venevision’s coverage of Machado’s meeting in Washington with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello — a hardliner wanted by the U.S. on a drug warrant — accused the media of playing into a plot by the Nobel Prize winner to sow chaos in Venezuela.

    “Without media attention, her notoriety fades away. Without headlines, she simply disappears,” Cabello warned on state TV, singling out Venevision’s coverage.

    But even on state TV — long a bastion of pro-government propaganda and ideological control — cracks have started to appear.

    Case in point: Rodríguez’s recent tour of a university campus in Caracas in which she was confronted by a small group of student protesters. While state TV made no mention of the students’ demands, the scene itself — in which a Rodríguez was shown calmly separating from her security entourage to “exchange ideas” with what the broadcaster called activists from “extremist parities” — would have been unthinkable a few weeks ago.

    Under Maduro, even the mildest of criticism was buried on state TV and broadcasts of the president’s frequent rallies and outdoor events stopped airing live after a series of embarrassing disruptions, including a 2016 visit to Margarita Island in which he was driven away by a group of angry, pot-banging protesters.


    Drawing inspiration from jailed activists

    While the outlook for an eventual democratic transition in Venezuela remains unknown, government opponents hope Rodriguez is unleashing forces that are beyond her control. Meanwhile, they continue to draw inspiration from those who suffered repression firsthand.

    Journalist and political activist Carlos Julio Rojas spent 638 days in a Venezuelan prison where, like dozens of other prisoners, he said he was repeatedly handcuffed, denied sunlight and confined to a tiny cell with no bed — sometimes for weeks at a time.

    When he was released last month as part of a goodwill gesture announced by Rodríguez, he says he was instructed to never discuss the abuse.

    His mandated silence lasted barely 15 days.

    “For me, not speaking meant I still felt imprisoned. Not speaking was a form of torture,” said Rojas, who was accused without proof of participating in a 2024 assassination plot against Maduro. “So, today, I decided to remove the gag and speak.”

    Goodman reported from Washington

    This story is part of an ongoing collaboration between The Associated Press and FRONTLINE (PBS) that includes an upcoming documentary.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Trump Administration to Create a Strategic Reserve for Rare Earths Elements

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration plans to deploy nearly $12 billion to create a strategic reserve of rare earth elements, a stockpile that could counter China’s ability to use its dominance of these hard to process metals as leverage in trade talks.

    The White House confirmed on Monday the start of “Project Vault,” which would initially be funded by a $10 billion loan from the US Export-Import Bank and nearly $1.67 billion in private capital. The minerals kept in the reserve would help to shield the manufacturers of autos, electronics and other goods from any supply chain disruptions.

    During trade talks last year spurred by President Donald Trump’s tariffs, the Chinese government restricted the exporting of rare earths that are needed for jet engines, radar systems, electric vehicles, laptops and phones.

    China represents about 70% of the world’s rare earths mining and 90% of global rare earths processing. That gave it a chokehold on the sector that has caused the U.S. to nurture alternative sources of the elements, creating a stockpile similar to the national reserve for petroleum.

    The loan would be for a period of 15 years. The U.S. government has previously taken stakes in the rare earths miner MP Materials, as well as providing financial backing to the companies Vulcan Elements and USA Rare Earth.

    Bloomberg News was the first to report the creation of the rare earths strategic reserve.

    Trump is scheduled on Monday to meet with General Motors CEO Mary Barra and mining industry billionaire Robert Friedland.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • In Minneapolis, All-Encompassing Immigration Story Tests a Newsroom in Midst of Digital Transition

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    With the eyes of a nation fixed on the unrest in Minneapolis, the events haven’t left local journalists overmatched.

    Over the past month, the Minnesota Star Tribune has broken stories, including the identity of the immigration enforcement officer who shot Renee Good, and produced a variety of informative and instructive pieces. Richard Tsong-Taatarii’s photo of a prone demonstrator sprayed point-blank with a chemical irritant quickly became a defining image. The ICE actions have changed how the outlet presents the news.

    At a time when many regional newspapers have become hollowed-out shells due to the decline in journalism as a business, the Star Tribune has kept staffing relatively steady under billionaire Glen Taylor, who has owned it since 2014. It rebranded itself from the Minneapolis Star Tribune and committed itself to a digital transformation.

    It was ready for its moment.

    “If you hadn’t invested in the newsroom, you wouldn’t be able to react in that way,” said Steve Grove, publisher and chief executive.


    Minnesota’s robust journalism tradition

    The Star Tribune hasn’t operated in a vacuum. Minneapolis has a robust journalism tradition, particularly on public radio and television. Sahan Journal, a digital newsroom focusing on immigrants and diverse communities, has also distinguished itself covering President Donald Trump’s immigration efforts and the public response.

    “The whole ecosystem is pretty darn good,” said Kathleen Hennessey, senior vice president and editor of the Star Tribune, “and I think people are seeing that now.”

    While national outlets have made their presence felt, strong local teams offer advantages in such stories. The Star Tribune’s Josie Albertson-Grove was one of the first journalists on the scene after ICU nurse Alex Pretti was shot dead on Jan. 24. She lives about a block away, and her knowledge of the neighborhood and its people helped to reconstruct what happened.

    Journalists with kids in school learned about ICE efforts to target areas where children gather by hearing chatter among friends. While covering a beat like public safety can carry baggage, Star Tribune reporter Liz Sawyer developed sources that helped her, along with colleagues Andy Mannix and Sarah Nelson, report on who shot Good.

    Besides those contacts, the staff simply knows Minnesota better than outsiders, Hennessey said.

    “This is a place with a really, really long and entrenched tradition of activism, and a place with really deep social networks and neighborhood networks,” she said. “People mobilize quickly and passionately, and they’re noisy about it. That’s definitely been part of the story.”

    A Signal chat tipped Tsong-Taatarii about a demonstration growing raucous on Jan. 21. Upon arriving, he focused his lens on one protester knocked to the ground, leaving the photographer perfectly placed for his richly-detailed shot. Two officers hold the man face-down with arms on his back, while a third unleashes a chemical from a canister inches from his face. The bright yellow liquid streams onto his cheek and splatters onto the pavement.

    What some have called the sadistic cruelty involved in the episode outraged many who saw the photo. “I was just trying to document and present the evidence and let people decide for themselves,” Tsong-Taatarii said.


    ‘A badge to prove I belong’

    In one enterprising story, the Star Tribune’s Christopher Magan and Jeff Hargarten identified 240 of an estimated 3,000 immigrants rounded up in Minnesota, finding 80% had felony convictions but nearly all had been through the court system, been punished and were no longer sought by police. Hargarten and Jake Steinberg collaborated on a study of how the size of the federal force compared with that of local police.

    Columnist Laura Yuen wrote that her 80-year-old parents have begun carrying their passports when they leave their suburban townhouse, part of the “quiet, pervasive fear” in the Twin Cities. Yuen downloaded her own passport to carry on her phone. “A document that once made me proud of all the places I’ve traveled is now a badge to prove I belong,” she wrote.

    A piece by Kim Hyatt and Louis Krauss detailed the health consequences of chemical irritants used by law enforcement — or thought to be used, since questions about what specifically was deployed went unanswered.

    “I really think they’ve done a commendable job,” said Scott Libin, a veteran television newsman and journalism professor at the University of Minnesota. He praised the Star Tribune’s story about the criminal backgrounds of immigrants as thorough and dispassionate.

    Since Hennessey, a former Associated Press editor, began her job last May, the Star Tribune has experienced a run of big stories, including the shooting of two state lawmakers and a gunman opening fire at a Catholic school in Minneapolis. And, of course, “we have a newsroom that still has muscle memory from George Floyd ” in 2020, Grove said.

    News compelled fundamental shifts in the way the Star Tribune operates. Like some national outlets, it has rearranged staff to cover the story aggressively through a continuously updated live blog on its website, offered free to readers. There’s also a greater emphasis on video, with the Star Tribune doing forensic studies on footage from the Pretti and Good shootings, something few local newsrooms are equipped to do. Traffic to its website has gone up 50 percent, paid subscriptions have increased and the company is getting thousands of dollars in donations from across the country, Grove said.

    “People have changed the way that they consume news,” Hennessey said. “We see that readers are coming back. You know, they’re not just waking up in the morning, reading the site and then forgetting about us all day long. They’re coming back a couple of times a day to check in on what’s new.”

    Most people in the newsroom are contributing to the story, including the Star Tribune’s food and culture team, and its outdoor reporters. “There are no normal beats anymore,” Albertson-Grove said.


    A rapid transformation to a digital-first newsroom

    Under Grove, a former Google executive, the Star Tribune has attempted a digital-first transition, turning over about 20% of its staff in two years. The paper shut its Minneapolis printing plant in December, laying off 125 people, and moving print operations to Iowa.

    “We face every single headwind that every local news organization in the country does,” Grove said. “But we do feel fortunate that we’re the largest newsroom in the Midwest and it’s part of the reason we’re able to do this now.”

    As a reporter, Sawyer says the public response to the outlet’s work, sharing stories and images, has lifted her spirits. Readers see it as public service journalism. Still, she could use a break. She and her husband, Star Tribune photographer Aaron Lavinsky, have a baby daughter and make sure to stagger their coverage. They can’t both be tear-gassed or arrested at the same time; who makes the daycare pickup?

    “I think both residents and journalists in this town are running on fumes,” she said. “We’re tired of being in the international spotlight and it’s never for something positive. People are trying their best to get through this moment with grace.”

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Starbucks Feels the Heat as More Chains Compete for US Coffee Drinkers

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    NEW YORK (AP) — Americans are drinking more coffee than they have in decades. But fewer of them are getting it from Starbucks.

    The company that revolutionized U.S. coffee culture remains America’s biggest player, with nearly 17,000 U.S. stores and plans to open hundreds more. But it’s facing unprecedented competition, which will make it harder to win back the customers it already lost.

    Starbucks’ share of spending at all U.S. coffee shops fell in 2024 and 2025; it now stands at 48%, down from 52% in 2023, according to Technomic, a food industry consulting firm. Dunkin ‘, a perennial rival that just opened its 10,000th U.S. store, gained market share in both of those years.

    Starbucks has other challengers, like the fast-growing drive-thru chains 7 Brew, Scooter’s Coffee and Dutch Bros. Chinese chains like Luckin Coffee and Mixue are opening U.S. stores. High-end coffee shop Blue Bottle, which has 78 U.S. stores, has opened two more since the start of the year. Even McDonald’s and Taco Bell are bolstering their beverage offerings.

    “People haven’t fallen out of love with Starbucks, but they’re now polyamorous in their coffee choices,” said Chris Kayes, chair of the management department in the George Washington University School of Business. “People are now experimenting with other coffees, and they’re seeing what’s out there.”

    Americans love coffee. In both 2024 and 2025, an estimated 66% of Americans reported drinking coffee every day, up 7% from 2020, according to the National Coffee Association, an industry trade group.

    Coffee chains are racing to cash in on that demand. The number of chain coffee stores in the U.S. jumped 19% to more than 34,500 over the last six years, according to Technomic, a consulting firm that researches the foodservice industry.

    Seattle-based Starbucks was a small, regional chain when former CEO Howard Schultz acquired it in 1987. Now, other small chains are seeing explosive growth. Nebraska-based Scooter’s Coffee had 200 locations in 2019; it now has more than 850. Arkansas-based 7 Brew, which had 14 locations in 2019, now has more than 600.

    “There’s too much supply relative to demand,” said Neil Saunders, a managing director and retail analyst at consulting firm GlobalData Retail

    Saunders said Starbucks’ size is somewhat of a disadvantage, since it has less ability to grow sales by opening new locations.

    “Honestly, they’re pretty saturated,” Saunders said. “They’re a very mature business.”

    “Growth doesn’t require us to become something new. It requires us to be exceptionally good at what we already are,” Starbucks Chief Operating Officer Mike Grams said.

    Starbucks expects to open more than 575 new U.S. stores over the next three years. It developed a smaller-format store that is cheaper to build but still has indoor seating, drive-thru lanes and mobile pickup. The company said the reduced scale would allow Starbucks stores to operate in locations they couldn’t before.

    Starbucks is also adding new products, like updated pastries and snackable foods that are high in protein and fiber, to try to win back customers.

    Lack of menu innovation is one reason Starbucks has struggled, especially among younger consumers who like novelty and will try new places to find it, Saunders said.

    Arizona-based Dutch Bros, for example, added protein coffee drinks in January 2024, nearly two years before Starbucks did. Energy drinks make up 25% of Dutch Bros’ business almost 14 years after the chain introduced them. Starbucks offered iced energy drinks for a limited time in 2024; executives said Thursday that customizable energy drinks would appear on the Starbucks menu soon.

    Dutch Bros, which is led by former Starbucks executive Christine Barone, has just over 1,000 shops in the U.S. and hopes to double that number by 2029. It’s betting that customers want speed and convenience; nearly all of its stores are drive-thrus with walk-up windows.

    Dutch Bros also focuses on value. In a recent meeting with investors, Barone pointed out that Dutch Bros’ medium drinks are 24 ounces; at Starbucks, a medium drink is 16 ounces.

    Luckin, whose app brims with coupons and promotions, is also value-oriented. On a recent afternoon, one of its nine New York stores buzzed with customers picking up mobile orders. The tiny shop had no seating.

    Xunyi Xie, who was visiting New York from his home in Delaware, said he stopped by to try a Velvet Latte because Luckin had a $1.99 drink promotion. Xie said he normally brews his own espresso, but if Luckin opened a store that was on his way to work, he would go there.

    As for Starbucks? “I think it’s overpriced,” Xie said.

    In 2024, the average customer spent $9.34 at Starbucks, compared to $8.44 at Dutch Bros and $4.68 at Dunkin’, according to an analysis by the investment research company Morningstar.

    Starbucks didn’t raise prices in its 2025 fiscal year and has vowed to be judicious about future increases. But Ari Felhandler, an equity analyst with Morningstar, said it would be a mistake for Starbucks to try to win over customers with discounts because competitors will always go lower.

    “Keep your prices the same and try to justify them,” Felhandler said. He thinks Starbucks’ store redesigns and new menu items will bring back traffic.

    Grams, Starbucks’ chief operating officer, said the company firmly believes its best way forward is not drive-thru-only stores or mobile pickup kiosks. It’s building cafes with comfortable seating — the “soul of Starbucks,” as he put it — that also serve mobile, drive-thru and delivery customers. Customers sometimes want something convenient, and they sometimes want to dwell, he said.

    “There’s always going to be competition. We’re aware of it, we keep an eye on it for sure, but we don’t try to be them,” Grams told The Associated Press. “We offer something that most people don’t, which is a legitimate space to sit down, enjoy and use it for a variety of different reasons.”

    But Kayes, of George Washington University, wonders if that strategy will be enough to keep Starbucks on top, or if customers who want a cozy or premium experience have already moved on to independent coffee shops or upscale chains like Blue Bottle.

    “In some ways, I think they are a victim of their own success,” Kayes said. “I do think that the aura of Starbucks as being something special and unique and exciting isn’t there anymore.”

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Rubio Details How the Trump Administration Will Control Venezuela’s Oil Money

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration soon will allow Venezuela to sell oil now subject to U.S. sanctions, with the revenue initially dedicated to basic government services such as policing and health care and subject to Washington’s oversight, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday.

    “The funds from that will be deposited into an account that we will have oversight over,” Rubio said, adding that the U.S. Treasury would control the process. Venezuela, he said, “will spend that money for the benefit of the Venezuelan people.”

    The U.S. will not subsidize oil industry investments in Venezuela, Rubio said, and is only overseeing the sale of sanctioned petroleum as an “interim step.”

    “This is simply a way to divide revenue so that there isn’t systemic collapse while we work through this recovery and transition,” Rubio said.

    “You are taking their oil at gunpoint, you are holding and selling that oil … you’re deciding how and for what purposes that money is going to be used in a country of 30 million people,” Murphy said. “I think a lot of us believe that that is destined for failure.”

    Under Maduro, Rubio said Venezuela’s oil industry benefited the country’s corrupt leaders and countries such as China, which purchased Venezuelan oil at a discount. Now, Venezuela’s interim leaders are assisting the U.S. in seizing illegal oil shipments, he said.

    The U.S. will give Venezuela’s current leaders instructions on how the money can and cannot be spent and conduct audits to ensure it is used as intended, Rubio said. He said Venezuela could use the money to pay for policing or to buy medicine.

    The fund was initially set up in Qatar to avoid having the proceeds seized by American creditors and because of other legal complications that stem from the U.S. not considering Maduro’s government legitimate, Rubio said.

    Hundreds of millions of dollars have already been set aside and as much as $3 billion more is anticipated, he said.

    “It’s an account that belongs to Venezuela, but it has U.S. sanctions as a blocking mechanism,” Rubio said. “We only control the dispersal of the money, we don’t control the actual money.”

    Earlier this month, acting Venezuelan President Delcy Rodríguez said cash from oil sales would flow into two sovereign wealth funds: one to support crisis-stricken health services and a second to bolster public infrastructure, including the electric grid.

    The country’s hospitals are so poorly equipped that patients are asked to provide supplies needed for their care, from syringes to surgical screws. They also must pay for lab and imaging tests at private hospitals.

    On Tuesday, during a televised event to announce the revamping of various health care facilities, Rodríguez said her government and the U.S. administration “have established respectful and courteous channels of communication” since Maduro was captured.

    Neither Rodríguez nor her government’s press office immediately comment on Rubio’s remarks Wednesday.

    At Rodríguez’s request, Venezuelan lawmakers last week began debating an overhaul of the country’s energy law. The proposed changes are meant to create conditions to attract much-needed private foreign investment.

    Garcia Cano reported from Caracas, Venezuela.

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  • What Travelers Can Expect as Southwest Airlines Introduces Assigned Seats

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    Starting Tuesday, customers on Southwest flights will have assigned seats and the option of paying more to get their preferred seat closer to the front of a plane or seats with extra legroom. The airline began selling tickets shaped by the new policy in July.

    Here’s what travelers can expect as Southwest does away with another of its signature features and becomes more like other airlines:

    Under the open-seat system, Southwest customers could check in starting exactly 24 hours before departure to secure places in boarding lines at departure gates.

    Early check-ins were placed in the coveted “A” boarding group, essentially guaranteeing they would find an open window or aisle seat. Others landed in “B” or “C,” the likelihood of only middle seats being available rising the longer they waited to check in.

    The Dallas-based airline’s unusual seating process began as a way to get passengers on planes quickly and thereby reduce the time that aircraft and crews spent on the ground not making money. It helped Southwest operate more efficiently and to squeeze a few more flights into the daily schedule; the system also was a key reason Southwest remained profitable every year until the coronavirus pandemic.

    The open-seating arrangement became less democratic over time, however, as Southwest also had starting allowing passengers to pay extra for spots near the front of the line.

    An eight‑group boarding structure is replacing the find-your-own-seat scrum. Instead of numbered metal columns at departure gates, passengers will file through two alternating lanes once it’s time for their group to board.

    The airline said its gate areas will be converted in phases starting Monday night, a process that could take about two months to complete. Columns that remain standing past Tuesday will have their numbers removed or covered in the meantime.

    Southwest is selling tickets at fares with different seating choices, including standard seats assigned at check‑in or paid preferred and extra‑legroom seats selected at booking. For certain flights, passengers also will have the option of paying for priority boarding beginning 24 hours before departure.

    Newly designed boarding passes will show seat assignments and boarding groups, according to Southwest. A reservation made for nine or fewer people, including families, will assign those passengers to the same boarding group.

    Southwest says the boarding groups are based on seat location, fare class, loyalty tier status and the airline’s credit card rewards benefits. Passengers who purchase seats with extra legroom will be placed in groups 1-2. Customers with premium fares and the airline’s “most loyal travelers” will also have access to preferential seats and earlier boarding, the carrier said, while those with basic fares will likely be placed in groups 6-8.

    With the switch to assigned seating also comes a revision of the airline’s policy for customers who need extra room. Under the new rule — also effective Tuesday — travelers who do not fit within a single seat’s armrests will be required to purchase an additional seat in advance.

    That represents a change from the airline’s previous policy that allowed passengers the choice to purchase a fully refundable extra seat before arriving at the airport, or request a free one at the gate. Under the updated policy, refunds are still possible but no longer guaranteed and depend on seat availability and fare class.

    In May 2025, Southwest also ended its decades‑old “bags fly free” policy, replacing it with baggage fees for most travelers.

    The changes mark one of the biggest transformations in the airline’s history, as it alters its longstanding customer perks to bring it more in line with the practices of other larger U.S. carriers.

    “We have tremendous opportunity to meet current and future customer needs, attract new customer segments we don’t compete for today, and return to the levels of profitability that both we and our shareholders expect,” Southwest CEO Robert Jordan said last year.

    When the Texas-based airline first announced plans in 2024 to switch to assigned seating, it said studies on seating options showed that customer preferences had changed over the years, with the vast majority of travelers saying they now want to know where they are sitting before they get to the airport.

    Jordan said at the time that open seating was the top reason surveyed travelers cited for choosing another airline over Southwest.

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  • EU Commission Indicates It’s Ready to Implement Mercosur Trade Deal Despite Parliament Vote to Delay

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    FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — The European Union is willing to implement a sweeping free trade agreement with the Mercosur group of South American countries on a provisional basis, the head of the EU’s executive commission said Friday, despite a vote by the EU parliament to delay ratification for legal review.

    The EU would be ready to act as soon as at least one Mercosur country ratifies, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said at the conclusion of a summit of EU leaders in Brussels where several national leaders raised the issue.

    “There is a clear interest that we ensure that the benefits of this agreement apply as soon as possible,” von der Leyen said at a news conference. “In short, we will be ready when they are ready.”

    No formal decision to implement the deal had been taken yet, she said.

    At the same news conference, Antonio Costa, head of the EU council of member governments, said the executive commission had the authority to move ahead on interim implementation.

    A decision to do that is likely to provoke criticism from opponents of the deal, led by France. On Wednesday, the parliament narrowly voted to refer the trade deal to the European Court of Justice for legal review, holding up ratification since the parliament cannot vote on ratification until the court rules. That could take months.

    The deal is central to Brussels’ plan to form trade relations outside a historic dependency on the U.S. in the wake of antagonism and aggression during U.S. President Donald Trump’s second term. They’ve struck deals from Japan to Mexico and are expected to sign a similar accord with India later this month.

    Supported by South America’s cattle-raising countries and European industrial interests, the accord is aimed at gradually eliminating more than 90% of tariffs on goods ranging from Argentine beef to German cars, creating one of the world’s largest free trade zones and making shopping cheaper for more than 700 million consumers.

    France, Europe’s major agricultural producer, wanted stronger protections for farmers and has sought to delay the pact.

    However German Chancellor Friedrich Merz called the vote to delay “regrettable” and has urged provisional application of the agreement.

    Ratification is considered all but guaranteed in South America, where the agreement has broad support.

    Mercosur consists of the region’s two biggest economies, Argentina and Brazil, as well as Paraguay and Uruguay. Bolivia, the bloc’s newest member, is not included the trade deal, but could join in the coming years. Venezuela has been suspended from the bloc and is not included in the agreement.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • TikTok Finalizes Deal to Form New American Version of the App

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    TikTok has finalized a deal to create a new American version of the app, avoiding the looming threat of a ban in the U.S. that has been in discussion for years.

    The social video platform company signed agreements with major investors including Oracle, Silver Lake and MGX to form the new TikTok U.S. joint venture. The new app will operate under “defined safeguards that protect national security through comprehensive data protections, algorithm security, content moderation and software assurances for U.S. users,” the company said in a statement Thursday.

    Adam Presser, who previously worked as TikTok’s head of operations and trust and safety, will lead the new venture as its CEO. He will work alongside a seven-member, majority-American board of directors that includes TikTok’s CEO Shou Chew.

    The deal marks the end of years of uncertainty about the fate of the popular video-sharing platform in the United States. After wide bipartisan majorities in Congress passed — and President Joe Biden signed — a law that would ban TikTok in the U.S. if it did not find a new owner in the place of China’s ByteDance, the platform was set to go dark on the law’s January 2025 deadline. For a several hours, it did. But on his first day in office, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to keep it running while his administration sought an agreement for the sale of the company.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Big Banks Report Soaring Profits Amid Tensions With Trump Over Credit Card Interest Rates

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    The latest trio of big banks reported their results Wednesday — Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo — and while each of them do different flavors of banking the theme is the same: profits are up, dealmaking is healthy, and the consumer is doing just fine.

    “While any number of risks continue, we are bullish on the U.S. economy in 2026,” said Brian Moynihan, CEO and chairman of Bank of America, in a statement.

    Moynihan added that businesses and consumers are “proving resilient.” Mark Mason, Citigroup’s chief financial officer, used the same word to describe how consumers and businesses were doing.

    “The U.S. economy is doing just fine. There’s downside risks out there, geopolitical risks in particular. But when I step back and look at it holistically, we have an economy that has managed uncertainty and risks in a resilient type fashion,” Mason told reporters on Wednesday.

    Up until last weekend, the big banks had found an ally in the White House in President Donald Trump. Trump signed the One Big Beautiful Bill into law in July, which pushed another significant round of tax cuts. Trump’s bank regulators have also been pushing a deregulatory agenda that both banks and large corporations have embraced. Many companies have embraced dealmaking last year, which led to a steady stream of investment banking revenues and fees to the big banks.

    But now the banks and Trump are butting heads. Trump said Friday that he wants to cap interest rates on credit cards at 10%, and has been supportive of his Justice Department’s investigation into Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, which bankers see as a threat to the independence of the nation’s central bank. Trump does not appear to be backing down on his attacks as well, doubling down in comments to reporters Tuesday night.

    For these big banks, many of which have large and profitable credit card businesses, these banks argue that a credit card interest rate cap simply cannot happen.

    “Affordability is a big issue and we look forward to collaborating with the administration on ways we can address this,” Mason with Citi said. “But an interest rate is not something we could or would support. It would restrict credit to those who need it the most and have a delirious impact on the economy.”

    Bank executives told reporters they weren’t seeing much evidence of a “K-Shaped” economy, where the rich get richer and the bottom half do less well. Further, the consumer continues to spend and other metrics about consumer financial health like delinquencies and charge-offs remain stable.

    Bank of America posted a profit of $7.6 billion, or 98 cents per share, up from $6.8 billion, or 83 cents per share, in the same period a year earlier. Revenue at the bank was $28.4 billion.

    Wells Fargo earned a profit of $5.36 billion, or $1.62 per share, compared to a profit of $5.08 billion, or $1.43 a share, in the same period a year earlier on revenues of $21.3 billion.

    At Bank of America, the bank reported a 6% increase in credit and debit card spending and credit card balances rose a manageable 3% year-over-year to $103 billion. Retail deposits also grew to $945.4 billion.

    Wells Fargo’s credit metrics also told a similar story. The bank saw consumer loan growth and more activity on its credit cards, but delinquencies and charge-offs were relatively stable.

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  • From Climbing Vacuums to Cyber Pets: Some Highlights of CES 2026

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    LAS VEGAS (AP) — CES 2026 offered a glimpse of a future that feels straight out of a sci-fi movie: bendable screens, paper-thin TVs and cars and gadgets that can think for themselves as they get to know you and your family’s wants and needs.

    As Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang put it, “The ChatGPT moment for physical AI is here.”

    And everywhere you looked, robots. They roamed the show floor, assisted workers and entertained crowds — from humanoid helpers and furry “cyber pets” to task-specific machines.

    Here’s a recap of some of the attention-grabbing gadgets at CES 2026, the annual technology trade show in Las Vegas:

    Lego leaned heavily into fan nostalgia this week to unveil its latest innovation, enlisting Lucasfilm Chief Creative Officer David Filoni and a lineup of familiar Star Wars characters, including Chewbacca, R2-D2, C-3PO and X-wing pilots.

    On Monday, the company introduced Lego Smart Play, a new platform built around connected bricks, tags and specially designed minifigures in partnership with Star Wars. These smart bricks are equipped with sensors that detect light and distance, triggering coordinated lights and sounds when used together to bring builds to life.

    The platform allows fans to build interactive scenes, like space battles or lightsaber duels.

    Another point for nostalgia: Clicks Technology is reviving the physical phone keyboard with its magnetic QWERTY model that clips onto phones.

    Co-founder Jeff Gadway said the company’s Power Keyboard “is one keyboard for all your smart devices.”

    It features a full QWERTY layout, with directional keys and a number row, in a callback to the Blackberry-era of smartphones for those who miss real buttons. The company said it also doubles as a wireless power bank.


    Return of LG’s Wallpaper TV line

    If you’re not familiar with CES, just know that new TV announcements are ubiquitous to the show — some big, some small, some even transparent. But LG brought something distinct to CES this year: an OLED TV that’s only 9mm thick.

    The South Korean tech company announced the OLED evo W6 model from its Wallpaper line just ahead of CES but reporters and industry representatives were able to see it for the first time at the show.

    As advertised, the screen displays video nearly edge-to-edge and is ridiculously thin (though it doesn’t roll up like its name implies). Like the previous models in its Wallpaper line, the TV’s inputs are housed in a box that sits nearby. LG representatives claim you can seamlessly stream 4K video and audio to the screen. No pricing was available but the new TV will be available in 77- and 83-inch sizes.


    The vacuum that can climb stairs

    Chinese robovac maker Roborock introduced a vacuum that literally sprouts chicken-like legs to navigate up and down stairs. There are vacuums out there capable of this feat (and there were even a few others at CES), but this one actually cleans the steps along the way.

    The newly introduced Saros Rover took its time in its ascent and descent during the demo on the showroom floor, but Roborock said it will be able to traverse almost any style of stairwell, including spiraled and curved. Unfortunately, no release date was given for the Rover, which the company says is still in development.


    Razer goes the smart glasses route with headphones

    Gaming tech company Razer brought a very interesting concept to CES, a set of over-ear headphones that can largely replicate the capabilities of currently available smart glasses (think Meta’s Ray Ban glasses).

    During the demo, Razer’s host asked the AI-powered headset — dubbed Project Motoko — to translate a Japanese restaurant menu into English and even asked it to search up information on The Associated Press.

    The headphones see using built-in cameras and take audio inputs from microphones. What AI model serves as the base of the headphones is up to the user, and it sounded like the usual suspects were supported — ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude.

    While it’s being developed largely as a consumer product, Razer did mention that it could be sold to businesses to gather data to train AI models. Razer said consumer data retrieved from the headphones wouldn’t be sold for training purposes and that enterprise sales would be siloed from consumer sales.


    Extended-reality platform aims to help process grief

    Do you wish you could speak one more time with a loved one who died unexpectedly? Or sit down for a conversation with your younger self? One company is exploring how immersive technology might make something like that possible, at least in part.

    VHEX Lab showcased its SITh.XRaedo, an immersive extended-reality grief therapy platform that creates a virtual avatar from a single photo and, according the company, is guided in real time by a trained XR therapist. Wearing a virtual reality headset, users can speak with the avatar, which responds through speech, nods, smiles and other gestures.

    The company, which won a digital health innovation award at CES, said the platform is designed to help people process grief and find closure, offering an alternative way to mourn.


    Personal mobility on autopilot

    Sit back, relax and enjoy the ride — that’s exactly what some conference attendees did at Strutt’s booth. Curious volunteers sat blindfolded in the robotics company’s new self-driving personal mobility chair called the EV1, which senses its surroundings and navigates on its own. With the push of a button and a forward lever, the chair guided riders through a small course, looping them around without requiring any active control.

    Tony Hong, CEO and founder of the Singapore-based Strutt, told AP that the chair has a full suite of sensors that helps it avoid bumps, walls, people and other obstacles, adjusting in real time as it drives.


    A “cyber pet” that turned heads at CES

    Allergic to dogs or cats but still craving a furry sidekick? Chinese tech brand Ollobot pitched a futuristic alternative: a rolling, purple “cyber pet” named OlloNi. Part plush toy, part AI robot, OlloNi is designed to feel warm and expressive, unlike the stiff, humanoid home robots that often dominate robotics, the company said.

    OlloNi uses a screen mounted at its neck, making eye contact and cycling through thousands of animated expressions meant to mirror human emotion and interaction.

    Scratch behind its fuzzy “ears,” and OlloNi’s wide digital “eyes” pop open in apparent delight, which drew attention and laughs from passersby on the show floor.


    Uber dives back into the robotaxi game

    Uber used CES to pull back the curtain on its upcoming robotaxi, offering the public a first look at a self-driving vehicle developed with luxury EV maker Lucid Motors and autonomous technology company Nuro.

    Uber called it the most premium robotaxi yet, with cameras, sensors and radar for full 360-degree awareness, along with a sleek, low-profile roof “halo” fitted with LED screens that display a rider’s initials and ride status. Inside, passengers can tailor the temperature, seat heating and music, while on-screen visuals show what the vehicle sees and the route it plans to follow in real time.

    The companies said on-road testing, led by Nuro, began in the San Francisco area last month, as they work toward launching the service before the end of the year.

    Associated Press journalists Aya Diab, Jessica Hill and Ty ONeil contributed to this report from Las Vegas.

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  • At CES, Auto and Tech Companies Transform Cars Into Proactive Companions

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    LAS VEGAS (AP) — In a vision of the near future shared at CES, a girl slides into the back seat of her parents’ car and the cabin instantly comes alive. The vehicle recognizes her, knows it’s her birthday and cues up her favorite song without a word spoken.

    “Think of the car as having a soul and being an extension of your family,” Sri Subramanian, Nvidia’s global head of generative AI for automotive, said Tuesday.

    Subramanian’s example, shared with a CES audience on the show’s opening day in Las Vegas, illustrates the growing sophistication of AI-powered in-cabin systems and the expanding scope of personal data that smart vehicles may collect, retain and use to shape the driving experience.

    Across the show floor, the car emerged less as a machine and more as a companion as automakers and tech companies showcased vehicles that can adapt to drivers and passengers in real time — from tracking heart rates and emotions to alerting if a baby or young child is accidentally left in the car.

    Bosch debuted its new AI vehicle extension that aims to turn the cabin into a “proactive companion.” Nvidia, the poster child of the AI boom, announced Alpamayo, its new vehicle AI initiative designed to help autonomous cars think through complex driving decisions. CEO Jensen Huang called it a “ChatGPT moment for physical AI.”

    But experts say the push toward a more personalized driving experience is intensifying questions about how much driver data is being collected.

    “The magic of AI should not just mean all privacy and security protections are off,” said Justin Brookman, director of marketplace policy at Consumer Reports.

    Unlike smartphones or online platforms, cars have only recently become major repositories of personal data, Brookman said. As a result, the industry is still trying to establish the “rules of the road” for what automakers and tech companies are allowed to do with driver data.

    That uncertainty is compounded by the uniquely personal nature of cars, Brookman said. Many people see their vehicles as an extension of themselves — or even their homes — which he said can make the presence of cameras, microphones and other monitoring tools feel especially invasive.

    “Sometimes privacy issues are difficult for folks to internalize,” he said. “People generally feel they wish they had more privacy but also don’t necessarily know what they can do to address it.”

    At the same time, Brookman said, many of these technologies offer real safety benefits for drivers and can be good for the consumer.

    On the CES show floor, some of those conveniences were on display at automotive supplier Gentex’s booth, where attendees sat in a mock six-seater van in front of large screens demonstrating how closely the company’s AI-equipped sensors and cameras could monitor a driver and passengers.

    “Are they sleepy? Are they drowsy? Are they not seated properly? Are they eating, talking on phones? Are they angry? You name it, we can figure out how to detect that in the cabin,” said Brian Brackenbury, director of product line management at Gentex.

    Brackenbury said it’s ultimately up to the car manufacturers to decide how the vehicle reacts to the data that’s collected, which he said is stored in the car and deleted after the video frames, for example, have been processed. “

    “One of the mantras we have at Gentex is we’re not going to do it just because we can, just because the technology allows it,” Brackebury said, adding that “data privacy is really important.”

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  • Asian Shares Trade Mixed After Wall Street Hits Records on Tech Gains

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    TOKYO (AP) — Asian shares traded mixed Wednesday, calming somewhat from the buzz set off by recent record rallies on Wall Street, while investors’ attention turned to global interest rates and uncertainty caused by developments in Venezuela.

    Despite a broad rally on Wall Street, Japan’s Nikkei 225 lost 0.9% to 52,041.97 and South Korea’s Kospi declined 0.5% to 4,503.23. Both had set records a day earlier.

    In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.3% to 8,708.50.

    Hong Kong’s Hang Seng declined 1% to 26,471.97, while the Shanghai Composite added 0.3% to 4,095.94.

    On Tuesday, broad gains led by technology stocks pushed prices on Wall Street to more records. The gains mirror much of the action from the previous year, when big technology stocks often drove the market to a series of records.

    The S&P 500 rose 0.6% to 6,944.82, setting a record on just the third trading day of the year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1% to 49,462.08, hitting a record for a second-straight day. The Nasdaq composite gained 0.6%, to 23,547.17.

    Small company stocks outpaced their larger counterparts as the Russell 2000 jumped 1.4%. It’s now just below its record set in December.

    Amazon, which surged 3.4%, is one of the most valuable companies in the world. Technology companies, especially those focused on artificial intelligence, are being closely watched this week during the industry’s annual CES trade show in Las Vegas. AI advances helped propel the broader U.S. market to a series of records in 2025.

    The Federal Reserve will be analyzing economic data for its next meeting in late January. The central bank cut its benchmark interest rate three times late in 2025. Wall Street expects the Fed to hold interest rates steady at its January meeting.

    Treasury yields rose in the bond market. The yield on the 10-year Treasury climbed to 4.16% from 4.15% late Monday. The yield on the two-year Treasury, which moves more closely with expectations for what the Federal Reserve will do, rose to 3.46% from 3.45% late Monday.

    In other trading early Wednesday, the price of benchmark U.S. crude oil fell 78 cents or nearly 1.3% to $56.35 per barrel. The price of Brent crude, the international standard, fell 59 cents to $60.11 per barrel.

    Gold prices slipped 0.3% and silver prices declined 1.5%. Such assets are often considered safe havens in times of geopolitical turmoil. The metals have notched record prices over the last year amid lingering economic concerns brought on by conflicts and trade wars.

    In currency trading, the U.S. dollar rose to 156.71 Japanese yen from 156.62 yen. The euro cost $1.1696, inching up from $1.1692.

    AP Business Writer Damian J. Troise contributed.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • The Most Interesting Tech AP Saw on Day 1 of CES

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    LAS VEGAS (AP) — Sure, Nvidia, AMD and Intel all had important chip and AI platform announcements on the first day of CES 2026, but all audiences wanted to see more of was Star Wars and Jensen Huang’s little robot buddies.

    CES is a huge opportunity annually for companies both large and small to parade products they plan to put on shelves this year. And, as predicted, artificial intelligence was anchored in nearly everything as tech firms continue to look for AI products that will attract customers.

    AP has been on the ground looking at booths and covering big announcements, here is a roundup of the highlights we saw on the first day of CES.

    The biggest buzzword in the air at CES is “physical AI,” Nvidia’s term for AI models that are trained in a virtual environment using computer generated, “synthetic” data, then deployed as physical machines once they’ve mastered their purpose.

    CEO Jensen Huang showed off Cosmos, an AI foundation model trained on massive datasets, capable of simulating environments governed by actual physics. He also announced Alpamayo, an AI model specifically designed for autonomous driving. Huang revealed that Nvidia’s next generation AI superchip platform, dubbed Vera Rubin, is in full production, and that Nvidia has a new partnership with Siemens. All of this shows Nvidia is going to fight increased competition to retain its reputation as the backbone of the AI industry.

    But once Huang called for two little, waddling, chirping robots to join him on stage, that’s all the audience wanted to see more of.


    The chips are back in town

    AMD CEO Lisa Su announced a new line of its famed Ryzen AI processors as the company continues to expand its footprint in the world of AI-powered personal computers.

    For gamers, AMD also showed off the latest version of its gaming-focused processor, the AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D.

    Meanwhile, Intel announced its new AI chip for laptops, Panther Lake (also known as the Intel Core Ultra Series 3), and said the company has plans to launch a new platform to address a growing market for handheld video gaming machines.

    Intel, a Silicon Valley pioneer that enjoyed decades of growth as its processors powered the personal computer boom, fell into a slump after missing the shift to the mobile computing era unleashed by the iPhone. It fell further behind after the AI boom propelled Nvidia into the spotlight.

    President Donald Trump’s administration stepped in recently to secure a 10% stake in the company, making the government one of Intel’s biggest shareholders. Federal officials said they invested in Intel to support U.S. technology and domestic manufacturing.


    Uber dives back into the robotaxi game

    Uber is giving the public a first look at their robotaxi at this CES this week. Uber, along with luxury electric vehicle manufacturer Lucid Motors and vehicle tech company Nuro, introduced an autonomous vehicle with an Uber-designed in-cabin experience.

    Uber calls it the most luxurious robotaxi yet. It features cameras, sensors and radars that provide 360-degree perception and a low-profile roof “halo” with integrated LEDs that will display riders’ initials to help them spot their car and track their ride status. Inside, riders can personalize everything from climate and seat heating to music, while real-time visuals show exactly what the vehicle is seeing on the road and the route it plans to take.

    Autonomous on-road testing began last month in San Francisco, led by Nuro, marking a major step toward what the companies said is a planned launch before the end of the year.


    Star Wars and Lego announce new a partnership

    When Lucasfilm chief creative officer David Filoni brought out an array of X-Wing pilots, Chewbacca, R2D2 and C-3PO, he won the Star Wars fandom for Lego.

    Lego announced its Lego Smart Play platform on Monday, which introduces new smart bricks, tags and special minifigs for your collection. The new bricks contain sensors that enable them to sense light and distance, and to provide an array of responses, essentially lights and sounds, when they are used in unison.

    Combine this with a newly announced partnership with the Star Wars franchise and now you can create your own interactive space battles and light-saber duels.


    LG reveals a new robot to help around the home

    File this one under intrigued, for now.

    The Korean tech giant gave the media a glimpse Monday of its humanoid robot that is designed to handle household chores such as folding laundry and fetching food. Although many companies have robots on display at CES, LG certainly is one of the biggest tech companies to promise to put a service robot in homes.

    It will be on display — and we assume demonstrating some of its purported abilities — beginning Tuesday, so we’ll have more to report soon.


    What’s new with lollipops?

    Music you can taste was on display Monday at CES: Lollipop Star unveiled a candy that plays music while you eat it. The company says it uses something called “bone induction technology,” which lets you hear songs — like tracks from Ice Spice and Akon — through the lollipop as you lick it or bite it in the back of your mouth, according to spokesperson Cassie Lawrence.

    The musical lollipops will go on sale after CES on Lollipop Star’s website for $8.99 each. And if that wasn’t enough star power, Akon was expected to visit the company’s booth Tuesday when CES opens to the public.


    Atlas holds up Hyundai’s (manufacturing) world

    Hyundai-owned Boston Dynamics publicly demonstrated its humanoid robot Atlas for the first time at the CES tech showcase, ratcheting up a competition with Tesla and other rivals to build robots that look like people and do things that people do.

    The company said a version of the robot that will help assemble cars is already in production and will be deployed by 2028 at Hyundai’s electric vehicle manufacturing facility near Savannah, Georgia.

    Delta Air Lines is taking entertainment to new heights as the “official airline” of the Sphere in Las Vegas. The airline announced a new multiyear partnership with Sphere Entertainment Co. that it says will deliver premium experiences to the venue, including a Delta SKY360° Club lounge.

    The carrier said SkyMiles members can unlock exclusive access to other experiences at the Sphere, starting during the final weekend of the Backstreet Boys’ residency in February with features including private suite seating, food and beverages. The partnership brings Delta branding to the Sphere’s massive exterior LED screen. Delta says more exclusive SkyMiles experiences will roll out in 2026 and beyond.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • A Rare ‘Thank You’ to the Media From the Trump Administration

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    In the wake of last weekend’s U.S. military action in Venezuela, the news media got something it has seldom heard from the Trump administration: a “thank you.”

    Secretary of State Marco Rubio credited news organizations that had learned in advance about last Saturday’s strike that led to the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro with not putting the mission in jeopardy by publicly reporting on it before it happened.

    Rubio’s acknowledgment was particularly noteworthy because Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has cited a mistrust of journalists’ ability to responsibly handle sensitive information as one of the chief reasons for imposing restrictive new press rules on Pentagon reporters. Most mainstream news organizations have left posts in the Pentagon rather than agree to Hegseth’s policy.

    Speaking on ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday, Rubio said the administration withheld information about the mission from Congress ahead of time because “it will leak. It’s as simple as that.” But the primary reason was operational security, he said.

    “Frankly, a number of media outlets had gotten leaks that this was coming and held it for that very reason,” Rubio said. “And we thank them for doing that or lives could have been lost. American lives.”

    Semafor, citing “people familiar with communications between the administration and news organizations,” reported that The New York Times and The Washington Post had both learned of the raid in advance but held off reporting on it to avoid endangering U.S. military personnel. Representatives for both outlets declined comment to The Associated Press on Monday.

    Withholding information on a planned mission for that reason is routine for news organizations, said Dana Priest, a longtime national security reporter at the Post who now teaches at the University of Maryland. Even after the fact, the Post has asked government authorities about whether revealing certain details could endanger people, she said.

    When The Atlantic magazine editor Jeffrey Goldberg was inadvertently included in a text chain last spring where Hegseth revealed information about a military attack in Yemen, the journalist did not report on the events until well after U.S. personnel was out of danger and the information had been thoroughly checked out.

    Most Americans learned of the Venezuela attack in the predawn hours of Saturday when President Donald Trump announced it on his Truth Social platform upon completion.

    While The Associated Press did not have advance word that the operation would happen, its journalists in Venezuela heard and observed explosions taking place there, and that was reported on the news wire more than two hours before Trump’s announcement. The U.S. involvement was not made clear until Trump’s post, however.


    Decisions on publication have many dimensions

    Hegseth, in defending rules that restrict reporters’ movements and reporting in the Pentagon, told Fox News last year that “we have expectations that you’re not soliciting classified or sensitive information.” The Times last month filed a lawsuit seeking to overturn the rules.

    Decisions on whether to report information that could put lives or a mission in danger often involve high-level discussions between editors and government officials. But Priest stressed that in a country with freedom of the press, the ultimate decision on whether to report the information lies with the news organization.

    Generations ago, President John F. Kennedy persuaded editors at the Times not to report when it learned in advance of a U.S.-backed attack by Cuban exiles on Fidel Castro’s forces at the Bay of Pigs in Cuba. The mission proved a monumental failure and a Times editor, Bill Keller, later said that Kennedy expressed regret that the newspaper had not reported on what it had known because it could have prevented a fiasco.

    Many mainstream journalists covering the military and national security have extensive experience dealing with sensitive issues, Priest said. But there’s a difference, she said, between reporting information that could put someone in danger and that which could prove embarrassing to an administration.

    “The reporters are not going to be deterred by a ridiculously broad censorship edict by the Trump administration,” Priest said. “They’re going to dig in and work even harder. Their mission is not to curry favor with the Trump administration. It’s to report information to the public.”

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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