U.S. Open follow modal Personalized Content Follow this section to personalize your feed and get instant alerts. Follow Go to your personalized feed WHY FOLLOW? Smart Alerts: Get notified about major news as it happens. Follow this tag to personalize your feed and get instant alerts. Follow Go to your personalized feed WHY FOLLOW?

Republicans are counting on the president to be generous and think about someone other than himself. Become a member to share 10 free articles a month. Welcome to this week's edition of the Surge, Slate's politics newsletter that has no time for a joke right here because we have important business to discuss. Starting next week, the Surge is going to look different: sleeker and fresher but still phenomenally trenchant. Alongside a refreshed design, the Surge will break down the news of the week into three categories: What you need to pay attention to now, what you need to keep an eye on, and which story is a bunch of nonsense you should ignore.

Follow this section to personalize your feed and get instant alerts. Follow Go to your personalized feed WHY FOLLOW? Smart Alerts: Get notified about major news as it happens. Follow this tag to personalize your feed and get instant alerts. Follow Go to your personalized feed WHY FOLLOW?

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Trump has shown reluctance in naming his successor, but he previously expressed interest in a potential ticket boasting Vice President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

A Judge Has Blocked the Pentagon's Attempt to Blacklist Anthropic A federal judge has called the Department of Defense's designation of Anthropic as a national security supply-chain risk "illegal and baseless." A federal judge on Thursday barred the Trump administration from designating Anthropic a national security risk over a dispute about the use of its AI models, ruling that the designation amounted to unconstitutional retaliation. The decision handed down by US district judge Rita Lin in California vacated the February 27 decision by defense secretary Pete Hegseth to label Anthropic a "supply-chain risk" and make the company ineligible for federal contracts. The ruling also lifted an additional punitive measure by Hegseth that prevented contractors or suppliers to the US military from doing business with Anthropic, a position Lin called "arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, and otherwise not in accordance with law." "Though the Department of War is undisputedly free to select the AI vendor of its choice, the evidence demonstrates that the broad measures imposed on Anthropic were illegal and baseless," Lin wrote in a 59-page ruling . The judge also ruled that nine agencies--including the Pentagon, the Treasury Department, the State Department, the Department of Homeland Security--had improperly imposed sanctions on Anthropic.

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Pete Hegseth's Plan for'High T' Troops Is a Junk-Science Fever Dream The defense secretary's idea of administering testosterone therapy to members of the US Armed Forces reveals little understanding of the complexity of hormones. US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has made no secret of his desire for a manlier military . He consistently argues that the US Armed Forces lowered their combat standards in order to include women. He's staged various photo ops in which he exercises and pumps iron with service members. In his speeches, Hegseth says that the Trump administration is restoring a " warrior ethos " to its legions of " war fighters ."

Pete Hegseth delivered a West Point commencement speech centered on God, duty, and sacrifice, while criticizing DEI programs that displaced military readiness and standards.

Five former US officials, including a former top military lawyer, have criticised the Pentagon for not acknowledging potential American involvement in a deadly strike on an Iranian school earlier this year. Some of those officials said it was highly unusual not to release even basic details of the strike after such a length of time. A missile hit a primary school in Minab during the opening salvos of the US-Israeli war on February 28, killing 168 people including around 110 children according to Iranian officials. In the two months since then the Pentagon has said only that the incident is under investigation. US media reported in early March that US military investigators believed American forces were likely responsible for hitting the school unintentionally but had not reached a final conclusion.