Say More Look Up Top creators, ranked Gift Ideas For Everyone On Your List Mashable's Best: E-readers, robovacs, laptops, earbuds, smart home and more Creator Playbook Mashable Selects In My Bag AI at School Safety Net Versus Trending Now All Series Sanders teams up with Democratic lawmakers to stop the government from using automated license plate readers. Rebecca Ruiz is a Senior Reporter at Mashable. She frequently covers mental health, digital culture, and technology. Her areas of expertise include suicide prevention, screen use and mental health, parenting, youth well-being, and meditation and mindfulness. Rebecca's experience prior to Mashable includes working as a staff writer, reporter, and editor at NBC News Digital and as a staff writer at Forbes.

Mashable's Best: E-readers, robovacs, laptops, earbuds, smart home and more Mashable Selects In My Bag Look Up Creator Playbook Say More AI at School Safety Net Versus Trending Now Back to School Good Connection: Uplifting stories for a digital age All Series Trump's AI-powered America.gov is here. It was built by DOGE alumni and runs on Grok. On day one, it backed the 2020 election results. Chance Townsend is the General Assignments Editor at Mashable, covering tech, video games, dating apps, digital culture, and whatever else comes his way. He has a Master's in Journalism from the University of North Texas and is a proud orange cat father.

United States Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Representative Greg Casar of Texas introduced a new bill that would impose sweeping restrictions on the artificial intelligence industry, including banning the development of what is called artificial superintelligence. The legislation, introduced on Wednesday, comes weeks after top AI industry researchers issued dire warnings that the technology could wipe out humanity within the next decade, according to a wave of industry insiders. The legislation would also call for a temporary pause on the development of advanced AI systems until a regulatory body that can oversee and develop safety standards is put in place, as well as establishing a cabinet-level department called the Department of Artificial Intelligence that would oversee the industry. The proposed agency would be tasked with regulating what are called frontier models -- a term referring to the most advanced AI models in development. The agency would ensure the models are not dangerous, and it would be empowered to remove the models from circulation if they do, in fact, become dangerous and supervise their destruction.

The Supreme Court will hear Suncor v. Boulder to decide whether climate lawsuits against energy companies belong in state court or under federal authority.

Data centers face growing voter backlash as Republican senators push for local decision-making over federal regulation and call for a moratorium on new construction.

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According to new documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, an undergraduate working with DOGE requested that his work for HUD count towards his University of Chicago degree. Christopher Sweet, an affiliate of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, requested college credit for his time in government, according to new documents obtained by a Freedom of Information Act request filed by Democracy Forward, a nonprofit legal organization. Sweet was stationed at the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and in emails between Sweet and Scott Langmack, another DOGE affiliate at HUD, it appears that Sweet was looking to frame his work at HUD as an independent study worth three college credits. Sweet joined HUD in the spring of 2025 as an undergraduate college student at the University of Chicago to work on building an AI tool that would crawl through the agency's rules and regulations and flag them for rescission, or the cancellation of contracts. The tool, called SweetRex, was intended to be rolled out across the federal government.

Say More Look Up Mashable's Best: E-readers, robovacs, laptops, earbuds, smart home and more Switch Off Creator Playbook Mashable Voices Trending Now Mashable Selects Safety Net Versus Gift Ideas For Everyone On Your List In My Bag All Series Trump blasts data center critics: 'Backwards and poor' When it comes to the controversial AI infrastructure, the president is at odds with a majority of his constituents. Chase joined Mashable's Social Good team in 2020, covering online stories about digital activism, climate justice, accessibility, and media representation. At the very least, a majority of U.S. citizens don't want one of the dozens of proliferating AI infrastructure projects to end up in their backyard, as complaints of environmental destruction, noise pollution, and water constraints reach a fever pitch. In a recent Truth Social post, the country's leader called data centers a golden goose that Americans would be remiss to push back on. The only reason that communities throughout the U.S.A. should not want Data Centers is if they want to end up being backwards and poor, the President wrote.

Living through Operation Metro Surge, and what came after. A former Assistant U.S. Attorney described the ground plan in Minnesota: "They were, like, 'Occupy Minneapolis like it was Falluja.' " Photographs by Philip Cheung for The New Yorker Michael Cavlan had settled into a routine of patrolling his neighborhood by car most mornings when, early on January 7th, he received an alert on his phone informing him about Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity near his house in Powderhorn, in South Minneapolis. The previous day, the Department of Homeland Security had announced that it was sending two thousand immigration agents to Minnesota to take part in Operation Metro Surge, a campaign of mass detention and deportation that the Trump Administration advertised as the largest D.H.S. undertaking ever. Cavlan, a salty, gray-haired nurse and union steward, is a first-generation Irish American; in 1969, his Irish Catholic parents, inspired by the U.S. civil-rights movement, had moved the ...