Author: potus

Verily headquarters in San Bruno, California.Courtesy: VerilyVerily is selling its stop-loss insurance subsidiary, Granular Insurance Company, to the insurance provider Elevance Health, the Alphabet health tech company confirmed to CNBC on Thursday.Verily is one of Google’s sister companies and operates within Alphabet’s “Other Bets” category. The Granular sale is the latest in a series of sweeping changes at the precision health company, which has slashed its workforce, restructured its business and overhauled its executive leadership in recent years.The terms of the deal were not disclosed. Verily launched Granular, initially called Coefficient Insurance Company, in 2020 with financial backing from the commercial…

CEO of Meta and Facebook Mark Zuckerberg, Lauren Sanchez, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk attend the inauguration ceremony before Donald Trump is sworn in as the 47th US President in the US Capitol Rotunda in Washington, DC, on Jan. 20, 2025.Saul Loeb | Via ReutersThe strengthening dollar is posing challenges for the biggest U.S. tech companies, which have become increasingly reliant on overseas revenue. With other currencies weakening, money made elsewhere is worth less when converted into dollars.Amazon should suffer less than its megacap peers as the e-commerce giant generates…

The courts are slamming the brakes on some of President Donald Trump’s efforts to quickly trim and transform the federal government.In his first weeks in office, Trump has signed more than 50 executive orders aimed at reshaping the government, from targeting birthright citizenship to changing how transgender inmates are housed. Government agencies have also used the orders to try to freeze federal funding nationwide and offer buyouts to the bulk of government employees.The flood of orders has led to over two dozen lawsuits to date and a number of court decisions halting — at least temporarily — some of Trump’s…

We are witnessing one of the worst and most costly foreign policy blunders in U.S. history. Less than three weeks into Donald Trump’s second term, he, Elon Musk and Secretary of State Marco Rubio have halted the U.S. Agency for International Development’s aid programs around the world. In so doing, they have imperiled millions of lives, thousands of American jobs and billions of dollars of investment in American small businesses and farms while severely undermining our national security and global influence — all while authoritarians and extremists celebrate their luck.I am shocked by the gleeful assault perpetrated by our own…

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy speaks during a keynote address at AWS re:Invent 2024, a conference hosted by Amazon Web Services, at The Venetian Las Vegas on December 3, 2024 in Las Vegas, Nevada.Noah Berger | Getty Images Entertainment | Getty ImagesAmazon said Thursday it plans to boost its capital expenditures to $100 billion in 2025, as it continues its investments in artificial intelligence.The capex figure exceeds last year’s spending of roughly $83 billion. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy had predicted in October that the company’s 2025 capex would surpass last year’s figure, primarily driven by growth in generative AI.”We spent $26.3…

In a little-noticed directive on her first day in office, Attorney General Pam Bondi ordered a halt to a years-old federal law enforcement effort to combat secret influence campaigns by China, Russia and other adversaries that try to curry favor and sow chaos in American politics.Buried on the fourth page of one of 14 policy memos Bondi issued Wednesday, the order disbands the FBI’s Foreign Influence Task Force and pares back enforcement of the Foreign Agents Registration Act, despite years of warnings by U.S. intelligence agencies that foreign malign influence operations involving disinformation were a growing and dangerous threat.“To free resources to address more pressing priorities, and end risks…

Republican congressional leaders met on Thursday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel at the Capitol, a show of support that comes after President Trump proposed that the United States “take over” the Gaza Strip and displace the millions of Palestinians living there.Mr. Netanyahu first met with Senator John Thune of South Dakota, the majority leader, followed by a meeting with a bipartisan group of senators where he discussed a range of issues including how the cease-fire was holding and would be carried out into the next phase to guarantee the rest of the hostages who have been held by…

For decades, successive presidents in Washington have favored some version of a two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. What no one imagined until now was that the second state would be American, not Palestinian.President Trump’s stunning plan to displace the entire Palestinian population of Gaza and have the United States take over the seaside enclave has not only convulsed the Middle East. It may have also all but written the obituary for the long-sought but maddeningly elusive goal of establishing a Palestinian state alongside Israel in peaceful coexistence.Any vision of a Palestinian state has included Gaza as an integral part…

IE 11 is not supported. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser.Now PlayingFear: Dreamers travel to Mexico to stay in the U.S.10:54UP NEXTScarred: The young victims of Israel’s airstrikes in Lebanon10:53Occupy and destroy: Israel’s systematic demolition of Lebanese border villages06:18America Speaks: What Happened in the 2024 Election04:03The destruction of Chimney Rock: A small mountain town grapples with its future05:31A Deadly Detour: Texas policy, heat fuel rise in migrant deaths08:55Born into war: Babies are an unstoppable force in Gaza15:27‘I haven’t come back’: Freed from Hamas, former hostages cope with life after Oct. 708:41Stolen Son: How a hostage mother…

A United States judge has temporarily blocked a buyout package offered to federal workers as an incentive to resign from their jobs, part of a larger push under President Donald Trump to whittle down the scale of government. On Thursday, US District Judge George O’Toole suspended the administration’s deadline to accept the buyout, which was set for 11:59pm Eastern Time (03:59 GMT, Friday). O’Toole explained the additional time was needed for his court to consider arguments against the measure, brought by unions representing nearly 800,000 government employees. The federal court in Massachusetts will hear full arguments in the case starting…