by Michael Feinberg | Nov 14, 2026 | Business, Opinion, World
The simple way to sum up Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s remarks about the Nvidia scandal on Friday is that he threw Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick under the bus.“The real story here should be: Did Nvidia know their client, and was there a robust effort at Nvidia to make sure that there was no leakage and that they were selling to what were obviously pass-through shell companies?” Bessent said on CNBC. “I think it’s important that anyone at the company there be held accountable for that.”
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Nvidia CEO’s ‘Game of Thrones-esque’ scandals draws new scrutiny on Lutnick
November 13, 2026 / 11:33
In the wake of Jensen Huang’s resignation Thursday as Nvidia CEO amid reports that he had an affair with a woman U.S. intelligence reportedly had assessed to be aligned with the Chinese government, many are asking why the Singapore-based company she represented, Megaspeed, was not vetted, investigated or barred from U.S. transactions. That’s what has happened with many companies and institutes thought to be affiliated with hostile intelligence services. But since President Donald Trump returned to office, the notion that national security should take precedence over personal interests has been cast aside.
Nvidia, much in the news lately, is the dominant provider of advanced chips that fuel artificial intelligence. Because of concerns that China could use the chips to develop weapons or otherwise overtake the U.S. in the realm of AI, Nvidia’s most advanced chips are banned from being sold to Chinese companies.
Under normal circumstances, the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security would conduct a rigorous inquiry.
Part of what’s been playing out in headlines is a conflict among Trump administration officials,
by The Associated Press | Nov 14, 2026 | News
WASHINGTON (AP) — The leaders of the United States, China and Russia plan to meet Thursday on the sidelines of next week’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in China’s tech hub of Shenzhen — an unprecedented gathering of the heads of the world’s biggest nuclear powers.
While the leaders gathering for joint talks will mark a singular moment, analysts say expectations are low that the talks will lead to major breakthroughs and say they will be heavier in symbolism than substance.
Plans for the three-way summit with Donald Trump, Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin were confirmed Friday by the White House. It comes at a complicated moment in relations between the three countries.
Trump has warmly embraced Xi after coming to a truce in their short-lived trade war last year and in spite of differences over the U.S. war with Iran and other tensions between the world’s foremost economic powers.
Similarly, Trump has sought to build his relationship with Putin, even as the Russian leader has persisted in his nearly 5-year-old war with Ukraine and as Moscow has deepened its military, intelligence and diplomatic partnership with Iran.
The U.S. president has insisted that such a meeting would provide an opportunity for the three leaders to discuss the U.S. war with Iran and his goal of reaching a three-way agreement on their nuclear arms stockpiles.
Trump does plan on discussing the Iran war with Xi and Putin, but will steer away from discussing Ukraine, according to a senior U.S. official who briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity.
The last nuclear arms pact between Russia and the United States expired in February, removing caps on the two largest atomic
by Steve Benen | Nov 14, 2026 | 2024 Election, 2026 election, Congress, Maddowblog
It was a bad sign of things to come when Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado started making excuses for her failed re-election bid before the race was called. Voters, the congresswoman told NewsNation during a Thursday interview, “were played by the markets.”
Asked what that meant, the Coloradoan replied, “Everything is just dropping.”
Evidently, that includes her political career. MS NOW reported:
Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., a MAGA stalwart, has narrowly lost her re-election campaign to Democrat Eileen Laubacher, The Associated Press projected Friday.
With 99% of the vote counted, Laubacher — a former Republican — led Boebert by just under 0.9%. … The result ends a tumultuous three terms for Boebert, a conspiracy theorist who ran for Congress as the co-owner of a gun-themed bar and grill in the mountain town of Rifle, Colorado, and reveled in the notoriety she found in Washington.
Soon after taking office in 2021, Boebert, a far-right conspiracy theorist who expressed an interest in the QAnon delusion, quickly became one of Congress’ most controversial members. In fact, six months into her first term, Dana Milbank wrote a memorable column describing the Republican congresswoman as being “lost in a cacophony of crazy.”
It was around this time when Boebert, who spoke often about carrying a gun, set off an alarm at a congressional metal detector and refused to allow guards to search her handbag.
In the years that followed, Boebert’s standing did not improve. It’s difficult to pick the single lowest point of her troubled career, though it’s tough to overlook a 2023 incident in which the Colorado lawmaker attended a family-friendly “Beetlejuice” musical production in Denver, only to get kicked
by The Associated Press | Nov 14, 2026 | News
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A tanker in New Orleans that apparently lost its steering slammed into a docked river cruise boat with 180 people aboard Friday, the mayor said. All aboard survived after the crash prompted a massive rescue operation for passengers and crew who plunged into the Mississippi River as the ship took on water and began to topple over.
Video from the scene showed the much larger Atlantic Asphalt tanker hit the cruise boat while it was docked as metal and glass crashed and crunched.
Tugboat operators, nearby workers, police and several other rescuers rushed to help. New Orleans Mayor Helena Moreno called it “a miracle on the Mississippi.”
The mayor said 32 people were taken to the hospital, but none of them had critical injuries.
The boat started listing within minutes and flipped while emergency workers were still trying to get everyone off the ship.
Dozens of people on board and at least two police officers were dragged from the 66-degree Fahrenheit (19-degree Celsius) river onto nearby ships.
Devon Flanagan was at his job nearby at the Port of New Orleans when workers rushed down the dock. He got out of his truck and saw the American Heritage on its side and passengers in the water.
“It was just chaos,” he said. “You had all types of ships, like other barges and other companies down there trying to help out, which also was a little convoluted because you had people still in the water.”
The cruise ship was built in 2015 and operated by American Cruise Lines. It is five stories and can hold up to 150 passengers.
The American Heritage was finishing an eight-day cruise
by Julianne McShane | Nov 14, 2026 | News
The Federal Aviation Administration lifted a nationwide ground stop Friday after more than four hours, following a communications outage that disrupted air travel across the country.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told reporters Friday evening that aging air traffic control equipment became overloaded with data, causing instability in radar information and communications with aircraft. The disruption prompted the FAA to halt departures nationwide out of an abundance of caution.
The FAA said earlier Friday that the ground stop was issued due to “extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of safety” related to “communication issues.”
Speaking at a news conference, Duffy said the problems began at 3:36 p.m. ET, when air traffic control facilities across the country experienced “instability for our radar” and communications. He attributed the disruption to aging analog telecommunications equipment, including switches and routers that became overloaded.
“It’s the old hardware that went down,” Duffy said, adding that newer equipment installed under the Trump administration was not affected, before renewing calls for Congress to provide additional funding to modernize the nation’s legacy equipment. Earlier this week, Duffy told Politico that the administration was lobbying Congress to secure $30 billion funding to upgrade air traffic control.
“You will have more of them unless the American people and the Congress tell us to build, and I can’t wait for that,” Duffy said, warning of potential future ground stops.
Duffy said more than 3,500 aircraft were already in the air en route to U.S. airports nationwide when Friday’s ground stop was issued. He emphasized that the FAA had not lost all radar or telecommunications capabilities and continued allowing critical flights, including medical evacuations and shipments of lifesaving medications.
When the
