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A prominent Cuban dissident is scheduled to defect to the United States on Saturday after completing a five-year prison sentence in the communist-run Caribbean country, according to his supporters and U.S. embassy officials. Artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcantara has been granted parole to enter the United States, a Facebook page run by his family and supporters announced Friday. “Following the brutal oppression he endured, Luis accepted asylum as the only way to continue his work as an artist and activist since early 2023,” supporters said on Facebook. “The State Security Service left him no other option to release him from…

President Donald Trump points while signing an executive order on AI next to Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in the Oval Office at the White House on December 11, 2025 in Washington.Al Drago | ReutersThe Trump administration has taken new steps to gain greater control over the rollout of future artificial intelligence model releases by determining which companies and entities are granted access to the latest frontier models, two sources familiar with the matter told CNBC. Until now, that decision has been in the hands of America’s AI giants. both human and OpenAI…

Months after analysts warned that demand for AI-powered memory chips would spill over into consumer electronics, India offers the strongest evidence yet that disruption is coming, with rising mobile phone prices reshaping the smartphone market. The memory chips in question, or RAM and storage components, are the same ones that tech giants need by truckload to build AI data centers. Manufacturers such as Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron are shifting production capacity to high-bandwidth memory, a specialized chip used in AI accelerators. This is because it is much more profitable per wafer than standard memory used in mobile phones and…

A man wearing a black Air Jordan T-shirt walks into a self-checkout kiosk in Louisiana. lowe’s Last spring, he looked like any other customer.Over the course of about seven minutes, he methodically summoned various gift cards worth $95 each, then used his cell phone to tap and pay for each card as employees in red vests surrounded him, surveillance video showed.Police said that, unbeknownst to employees, the man was part of a sprawling Chinese criminal organization that used stolen credit cards to purchase gift cards while a group of Southeast Asian fraudsters guided him through each transaction via wireless headphones…

The top lawyer at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the United States’ federal tax collection agency, is set to resign amid rumors of a clash with President Donald Trump’s White House.Ken Kies has served as Deputy Chief Counsel for the IRS and Assistant Secretary for Taxation at the U.S. Treasury.Recommended stories list of 3 itemsend of listBut this week, reports emerged that he would resign from his position at the Internal Revenue Service following recent signs of turmoil within the Trump administration.On Friday, news outlets including Reuters and the Wall Street Journal reported that Mr. Keith had been “forced out”…

Smoke from the Canadian wildfires has entered the United States, causing air quality to plummet and a thick brown haze blanketing the landscape. Poor air quality has been a problem in New York since Wednesday, when a cloud of smoke descended near the ground. Blue skies over the New York skyline on July 14, 2026. earth camera On July 16, 2026, smoke blanketed the New York skyline. earth camera Smoke blankets the New York skyline Thursday compared to Tuesday’s blue skies. earth camera Washington, D.C., had largely avoided dangerous air until a thick haze settled over the capital on Friday.…

Agility Robotics will open a 60,000-square-foot facility to train humanoid robots in Fremont, California, just up the highway from the factory where Tesla is expected to begin manufacturing its Optimus robot this year. Tesla is increasing its bet on Optimus. Elon Musk recently said he expects it to be the “biggest product ever” “if it’s available beyond Tesla within the next year.” Agility doesn’t have Tesla’s capital, but it already has a robot, Digit, that can help in the real world. The robot is already generating revenue by transporting totes and bins in manufacturing and warehouse environments for customers such…

Smoke from massive wildfires in Canada engulfs the New York City skyline on July 16, 2026, reducing visibility and casting an orange haze over the city.Selcuk Achar | Anadolu | Getty ImagesPresident Donald Trump on Friday blamed Canada for the wildfires blanketing the United States in haze and said he would add the cost of that pollution to existing tariffs.President Trump called the situation “totally unacceptable” and accused Ottawa of failing to properly respond to the fires that have caused air quality in major U.S. cities to reach dangerous levels for several days.The costs the United States incurs as a…

A powerful earthquake struck southern Mexico on Friday, shaking neighboring countries Guatemala and El Salvador, and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) measured a preliminary magnitude of 7.3. The epicenter of the quake was located 48 kilometers southwest of Acres Cerdan, a town in Chiapas state on Mexico’s coast, the USGS said. The earthquake appears to have caused moderate to severe shaking along the coast. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC) had warned that dangerous tsunamis could occur within 300 kilometers from the epicenter. Guatemala has observed several tsunamis less than 1 meter above the tide level, but said the threat…

Traders attend the IPO of Brookfield-backed data center provider CSquare Inc. at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on July 16, 2026 in New York City, USA.Brendan McDiarmid | ReutersWall Street continued its weekly decline, with stocks falling again on Friday as traders weighed recent developments in semiconductors along with the latest quarterly reports.Broad market indexes fell 1%; Nasdaq Composite Tech stocks came under scrutiny, falling 1.4%. of Dow Jones Industrial Average It fell by 374 points (0.7%).Major stock benchmarks have also fallen from last week to today, with the S&P 500 down more than 1% and the Nasdaq down…