Six months ago Republican Senator Josh Hawley proposed legislation banning downloads of TikTok in the U.S. But this week he told the Wall Street Journal that "TikTok and its dark-money cronies are spending vast amounts of money to kill these bills."

The newspaper argues that TikTok's "friends" in the U.S. government — backed by billionaire financier Jeff Yass — "helped stall attempts to outlaw America's most-downloaded app." Yass's investment company, Susquehanna International Group, bet big on TikTok in 2012, buying a stake in parent company ByteDance now measured at about 15%. That translates into a personal stake for Yass of 7% in ByteDance. It is worth roughly $21 billion based on the company's recent valuation, or much of his $28 billion net worth as gauged by Bloomberg.

Yass is also one of the top donors to the Club for Growth, an influential conservative group that rallied Republican opposition to a TikTok ban. Yass has donated $61 million to the Club for Growth's political-spending arm since 2010, or about 24% of its total, according to federal records. Club for Growth made public its opposition to banning TikTok in March, in an opinion article by its president, at a time when sentiment against the platform among segments of both parties was running high on Capitol Hill... With many Democrats already skeptical of a ban, the whittling away of Republican support killed momentum for several bills, including the bipartisan Restrict Act backed by the Biden administration...

TikTok's own lobbying efforts in Washington have included hundreds of meetings and other contacts, according to a person familiar with the matter. One of its main arguments to Republicans has been that a majority of ByteDance's shareholders are Americans, and some are well-connected conservatives, this person said. The lobbying appears to have helped push House Republican lawmakers to back away from the idea of a ban on TikTok and focus instead on legislation that would put new legal protections in place for users' personal data...

The Biden administration hasn't indicated any change in its effort to ban the app or force its sale. It could still try to use executive powers to ban it, or force a sale to remove Chinese control. But without legislation, analysts say those orders could be overturned in court.

The Internal Revenue Service has started using artificial intelligence to investigate tax evasion at multibillion-dollar partnerships as it looks for ways to better police hedge funds, private equity groups, real estate investors and large law firms. From a report: The announcement on Friday demonstrated how a more muscular I.R.S. is using some of the $80 billion allocated through last year's Inflation Reduction Act to target the wealthiest Americans and tackle the kinds of cases that had become too complex and cumbersome for the beleaguered agency to handle. The agency's new funding is intended to help the I.R.S. raise more federal revenue by cracking down on tax cheats and others who use sophisticated accounting maneuvers to avoid paying what they owe. But the allocation has been politically contentious, with Republicans claiming that the I.R.S. will use the funding to harass small businesses and middle-class taxpayers.

Earlier this year, Republicans succeeded in clawing back $20 billion as part of an agreement to raise the nation's borrowing cap. That political fight has put the onus on Democrats and the Biden administration to show that the funding is primarily enabling the I.R.S. to target the rich. "These are complex cases for I.R.S. teams to unpack," Daniel Werfel, the I.R.S. commissioner, said in a briefing with reporters. "The I.R.S. has simply not had enough resources or staffing to address partnerships; in a real sense, we've been overwhelmed in this area for years."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: A federal judge yesterday granted Google's motion to dismiss a lawsuit filed by the Republican National Committee (RNC), which claims that Google intentionally used Gmail's spam filter to suppress Republicans' fundraising emails. An order (PDF) dismissing the lawsuit was issued yesterday by US District Judge Daniel Calabretta. The RNC is seeking "recovery for donations it allegedly lost as a result of its emails not being delivered to its supporters' inboxes," Calabretta noted. But Google correctly argued that the lawsuit claims are barred by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the judge wrote. The RNC lawsuit was filed in October 2022 in US District Court for the Eastern District of California.

"While it is a close case, the Court concludes that... the RNC has not sufficiently pled that Google acted in bad faith in filtering the RNC's messages into Gmail users' spam folders, and that doing so was protected by Section 230. On the merits, the Court concludes that each of the RNC's claims fail as a matter of law for the reasons described below," he wrote. Calabretta, a Biden appointee, called it "concerning that Gmail's spam filter has a disparate impact on the emails of one political party, and that Google is aware of and has not yet been able to correct this bias." But he noted that "other large email providers have exhibited some sort of political bias" and that if Google did not filter spam, it would harm its users by subjecting them "to harmful malware or harassing messages. On the whole, Google's spam filter, though in this instance imperfect, is not morally blameworthy."

The RNC was given leave to amend another claim that alleged intentional interference with prospective economic relations under California law. The judge dismissed the claim as follows: "The RNC argues that Google's conduct was independently wrongful because '(1) it is political discrimination against the RNC, (2) it is dishonest to Google's users and the public, and (3) Google repeatedly lied about it.' As established above, political discrimination is not prohibited by California anti-discrimination laws and so Google's alleged discrimination would not be unlawful. The latter two reasons do not provide a 'determinable legal standard' under which the Court could find the conduct wrongful; they rest on a 'nebulous' theory of wrongfulness which other courts have rejected." The RNC "has failed to establish that Defendant's alleged interference constituted a separate, independently 'wrongful act' that would be an appropriate predicate offense" but "will be granted leave to amend this claim to establish that Defendant's conduct was unlawful by some legal measure," Calabretta wrote. Google said in a statement: "We welcome the Court's finding that there are no plausible allegations that Gmail's spam filters discriminate for political purposes. We will continue investing in spam-filtering technologies that protect people from unwanted emails while still allowing senders to reach the inboxes of users who want their messages."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Political polarization in the US has become a major issue, as Republicans and Democrats increasingly inhabit separate realities on topics as diverse as election results and infectious diseases. [...] Now, a team of researchers has tested whether social media can potentially help the situation by getting people with opposite political leanings talking to each other about controversial topics. While this significantly reduced polarization, it appeared to be more effective for Republican participants. The researchers zeroed in on two concepts to design their approach. The first is the idea that simply getting people to communicate across the political divide might reduce the sense that at least some of their opponents aren't as extreme as they're often made out to be. The second is that anonymity would allow people to focus on the content of their discussion, rather than worrying about whether what they were saying could be traced back to them.

The researchers realized that they couldn't have any sort of control over conversations on existing social networks. So, they built their own application and hired professionals to do the graphics, support, and moderation. [...] People were randomly assigned to a few conditions. Some didn't use the app at all and were simply asked to write an essay on one of the topics under consideration (immigration or gun control). The rest were asked to converse on the platform about one of these topics. Every participant in these conversations was paired with a member of the opposing political party. Their partners were either unlabeled, labeled as belonging to the opposing party, or labeled as belonging to the same party (although the latter is untrue). Both before and after use of the app, participants answered questions about their view of politicized issues, members of their own party, and political opponents. These were analyzed in terms of issues and social influences, as well as rolled into a single index of polarization for the analysis.

The conversations appeared to have an effect, with polarization lowered by about a quarter of a standard deviation among those who engaged with political opponents that were labeled accordingly. Somewhat surprisingly, conversation partners who were mislabeled had a nearly identical effect, presumably because they suggested that a person's own party contained a diversity of perspectives on the topic. In cases where no party affiliation was given, the depolarization was smaller (0.15 standard deviations). The striking thing is that most of the change came from Republican participants. There, polarization was reduced by 0.4 standard deviations. In contrast, Democratic participants only saw it drop by 0.1 standard deviations -- a change that wasn't statistically significant. The error bars of the two groups of party members overlapped, however, so while large, it's not clear what this difference might tell us. The researchers went back and ran the conversations through sentiment analysis and focused on people whose polarization had dropped the most. They found that their conversation partners used less heated language at the start of the conversation. So it appears that displaying respect for your political opponents can still make a difference, at least in one-on-one conversations. While the conversations had a larger impact on people's views of individual issues, it also influenced their opinion of their political opponents more generally, and the difference between the two effects wasn't statistically significant. The findings have been published in the journal Nature Human Behavior.

According to a new Reuters/Ipsos survey, nearly half of American adults support a ban on TikTok. From the report: TikTok, owned by Chinese tech giant ByteDance and used by tens of millions of Americans, has faced calls from U.S. lawmakers for a nationwide ban over concerns about possible Chinese government influence. Some 47% of respondents to the two-day poll, which concluded on Tuesday, said they at least somewhat supported "banning the social media application, TikTok, from use in the United States," while 36% opposed a ban and 17% said they didn't know.

Fifty-eight percent of Republicans favored a ban, compared to 47% of Democrats, the poll showed. The online Reuters/Ipsos poll was conducted nationwide, collecting responses from 1,005 adults, including 443 Democrats and 346 Republicans. It had a credibility interval, a measure of precision, of about 4 percentage points in either direction. Last month, a Pew Research Center survey found that a majority of Americans (59%) believe the social media app is a threat to the national security of the United States.

Sam Bankman-Fried used money he stole from customers of his FTX cryptocurrency exchange to make more than $100 million in political campaign contributions before the 2022 U.S. midterm elections, federal prosecutors said on Monday. Reuters reports: An amended indictment accused the 31-year-old former billionaire of directing two FTX executives to evade contribution limits by donating to Democrats and Republicans, and to conceal where the money came from. "He leveraged this influence, in turn, to lobby Congress and regulatory agencies to support legislation and regulation he believed would make it easier for FTX to continue to accept customer deposits and grow," the indictment said.

Bankman-Fried faces seven counts of conspiracy and fraud over FTX's collapse, though the indictment no longer includes conspiracy to violate campaign finance laws as a separate count. [...] Bankman-Fried's indictment does not name the two people prosecutors say he used for "straw donors" to donate money at his direction. But other court papers and Federal Elections Commission data show they are Nishad Singh and Ryan Salame. Singh, FTX's former engineering chief, pleaded guilty to fraud and campaign finance violations in February. He donated $9.7 million to Democratic candidates and causes, and said in court he knew the money came from FTX customers.

Salame, the former co-CEO of FTX's Bahamian unit, gave more than $24 million to Republican candidates and causes in the 2022 election cycle, according to Federal Election Commision data. He has not been charged with a crime. In a separate court filing on Monday, prosecutors said Salame's lawyer had told them he would invoke his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination if called to testify. Prosecutors said Salame told a family member in a November 2021 message that Bankman-Fried wanted to use political donations to "weed-out" anti-crypto Democratic and Republican lawmakers, and would likely "route money through me to weed out that republican [sic] side." On Friday, a U.S. judge revoked Sam Bankman-Fried's bail due to probable cause that he tampered with witnesses at least twice. He is being sent to jail.

A ban on most kinds of traditional bulbs renews a cultural squabble between regulatory efforts to curb energy consumption and the very American impulse to do whatever one wants in one's domicile. The New York Times: The switchboard at Lightbulbs.com, a (pretty self-explanatory) e-commerce website, lit up with panicked callers on Tuesday, who all wanted to know if the news was true. Had the government just banned the sale of incandescent bulbs? Yes, mostly. Was this decision part of an elaborate political plot? No, mostly. Just what were fans of incandescent lighting supposed to do now? EBay, maybe?

Much like its cousin, the gas stove, the humble light bulb has become a flashpoint in a cultural squabble between environmental regulatory efforts and the very American impulse to do whatever one wants in one's domicile. But unlike the gas stove debate, which grew so heated (sorry) that it drew legislation from Republicans hoping to protect the noble but possibly dangerous appliance, the ban on the sale of most incandescent bulbs went quietly into effect on August 1. (The Biden administration denied trying to ban gas stoves.)

The response to the bulb ban was more of a whimper than a battle cry. "Thomas Edison brought the incandescent light bulb to the masses, and in 2023 Joe Biden banned it in America," officials with the Republican Party of New Mexico wrote in a tweet. "The Biden administration's government overreach continues." Other critics were more concerned about the quality of light affecting their quality of life: "I often stay up late at my desk, and the warm glow of the lamp is like company as I read and write. Ugh. There are people in power who are dedicated to sucking all joy out of the world," Joseph Massey, a self-described "not woke" writer, tweeted.

According to new research published Thursday, conservatives on Facebook during the 2020 presidential election were more isolated and saw more misinformation than the platform's liberal users -- though Facebook widely affected users' political content in different ways. Slashdot reader RUs1729 shared one of the four peer-reviewed studies, appearing in the journals Science and Nature. Forbes reports: The study, led by two researchers from the University of Texas and New York University, had hundreds of thousands of participants and analyzed mass amounts of Facebook user data. One of the study's papers, which used aggregated data for 208 million U.S. Facebook users, found that most misinformation on Facebook existed within conservative echo chambers, which did not have an equivalent on the liberal side of the platform. The paper found that news outlets on the right post a higher fraction of news stories rated false by Meta's third-party fact-checking program, meaning conservative audiences are more exposed to unreliable news.

In a separate paper that assigned users to Facebook and Instagram feeds chronologically instead of algorithm-based feeds, which are the platforms' default feed types, researchers found users on chronological feeds were less engaged and saw more political content compared to those viewing algorithm-based feeds, along with more content from untrustworthy sources and more content from ideologically moderate friends and sources with mixed audiences. However, the feed analysis noted replacing algorithmic feeds with chronological ones did not create any detectable changes in political attitudes, knowledge or offline behavior.

Another paper assigned nearly 9,000 U.S.-based Facebook users feeds with no reshares, later concluding that the removal of reshared content "substantially" lessened the amount of political news, and content from all untrustworthy sources decreased overall. The two lead researchers and 15 other academics, who had control rights for the study's papers, declined compensation from Meta to ensure an ethical study was completed.

A key congressional committee on Wednesday advanced a bipartisan bill that aims to develop a regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies, a milestone for Capitol Hill in its efforts to codify federal oversight for the digital asset industry. From a report: The bill passed by the House Financial Services Committee would define when a cryptocurrency is a security or a commodity and expand the Commodity Futures Trading Commission's (CFTC) oversight of the crypto industry, while clarifying the Securities and Exchange Commission's jurisdiction, as many crypto advocates complain of the agency's perceived overreach. A handful of Democrats, including Reps. Jim Himes and Ritchie Torres, joined committee Republicans in voting for the bill. The House Agriculture Committee is scheduled to consider the same bill Thursday. "As other jurisdictions like the UK, the [European Union], Singapore and Australia have moved forward with clear regulatory frameworks for digital assets, the United States is at risk of falling behind. We intend to change that today," said Representative Patrick McHenry, the Republican chair of the House Financial Services Committee, at the markup.

The U.S. is concealing a longstanding program that retrieves and reverse engineers unidentified flying objects, a former Air Force intelligence officer testified Wednesday to Congress. The Pentagon has denied his claims. Associated Press: Retired Maj. David Grusch's highly anticipated testimony before a House Oversight subcommittee was Congress' latest foray into the world of UAPs -- or "unidentified aerial phenomena," which is the official term the U.S. government uses instead of UFOs. While the study of mysterious aircraft or objects often evokes talk of aliens and "little green men," Democrats and Republicans in recent years have pushed for more research as a national security matter due to concerns that sightings observed by pilots may be tied to U.S. adversaries.

Grusch said he was asked in 2019 by the head of a government task force on UAPs to identify all highly classified programs relating to the task force's mission. At the time, Grusch was detailed to the National Reconnaissance Office, the agency that operates U.S. spy satellites. "I was informed in the course of my official duties of a multi-decade UAP crash retrieval and reverse engineering program to which I was denied access," he said. Asked whether the U.S. government had information about extraterrestrial life, Grusch said the U.S. likely has been aware of âoenon-humanâ activity since the 1930s. The Pentagon has denied Grusch's claims of a coverup. In a statement, Defense Department spokeswoman said investigators have not discovered "any verifiable information to substantiate claims that any programs regarding the possession or reverse-engineering of extraterrestrial materials have existed in the past or exist currently." The statement did not address UFOs that are not suspected of being extraterrestrial objects, AP reported.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from PBS: An IRS plan to test drive a new electronic free-file tax return system next year has got supporters and critics of the idea mobilizing to sway the public and Congress over whether the government should set up a permanent program to help people file their taxes without needing to pay somebody else to figure out what they owe. On one side, civil society groups this week launched a coalition to promote the move toward a government-run free-file program. On the other, tax preparation firms like Intuit -- the parent company of TurboTax -- and H&R Block have been pouring millions into trying to stop the idea cold. The advocacy groups are exponentially out-monied.

An April AP analysis found that overall, Intuit, H&R Block, and other private companies and advocacy groups for large tax preparation businesses, as well as proponents in favor of electronic free file, have reported spending $39.3 million since 2006 to lobby on "free-file" and other matters. Federal law doesn't require domestic lobbyists to itemize expenses by specific issue, so the sums are not limited to free-file. Intuit spent at least $25.6 million since 2006 on lobbying, H&R Block about $9.6 million and the conservative Americans for Tax Reform roughly $3 million. In contrast, the NAACP has spent $140,000 lobbying on "free-file" since 2006 and Public Citizen has spent $110,000 in the same time frame. "What we have on our side is public opinion," said Igor Volsky, executive director of the liberal Groundwork Action advocacy group. Volsky's organization and leaders from Public Citizen, the Center for the Study of Social Policy, Code for America, the Economic Security Project and others launched the "Coalition for Free and Fair Filing" on Wednesday. The group's mission is to "ensure all U.S. taxpayers can easily file tax returns and get the tax credits they deserve by safeguarding and expanding" the new IRS program. "The overwhelming majority of people demand a free-file option," Volsky said. "Now the question for us is how do you channel that into effective political pressure."

The IRS in May released a report that said most taxpayers are interested in filing their taxes directly to the IRS for free, and concurrently announced plans to launch the pilot program for the 2024 filing season. The goal is to test a direct file system that will help the IRS decide whether to move forward with a more permanent program. That idea has faced the immediate threat of budget cuts from congressional Republicans. Republicans on the House Appropriations Committee in June proposed a budget rider that would prohibit funds to be used for the IRS to create a government-run tax preparation software, unless approved by a group of House and Senate committees. The move "safeguards the IRS from an obvious conflict of interest where the tax collector becomes the tax preparer," the bill's summary states.

dcblogs writes: According to federal officials at a U.S. House hearing Thursday, the monumental federal buildings in Washington are largely empty, with some agencies using 25% or less of their headquarters' building capacity on average. The government owns some 511 million of square feet of office space, and capacity problems open the door to the possibility of conversions to housing or commercial uses. Commercial reuse has happened before. In 2013, the General Services Administration leased the Old Post Office Building at 1100 Pennsylvania Ave., to the Trump organization for a hotel.

"The taxpayer is quite literally paying to keep the lights on even when no one is home," said Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.), who chairs the infrastructure subcommittee meeting. The blame for the low utilization has several causes: a shift to hybrid work, out-of-date buildings that waste space, and designs before technology reduced the need for certain types of workers. The Republicans want federal workers to return to offices and reduce telecommuting to at least pre-pandemic levels. In February, the House passed H.R. 139, the Stopping Home Office Work's Unproductive Problems Act of 2023 -- or the Show Up Act -- requiring agencies to revert to 2019 pre-pandemic telework policies. A companion bill, S. 1565, is pending in the Senate. It has six Republican sponsors but no Democrats.

Lina Khan, the progressive head of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC), faced tough questions on Thursday from a Republican-led House committee about court fights over multi-billion dollar mergers the agency opposed and lost. From a report: Representative Kevin Kiley, Republican from California, asked Khan about the cases that the agency had lost. "We fight hard when we believe there was a law violation, and unfortunately things don't always go our way," responded Khan. "Are you bringing cases you expect to lose?" Kiley asked later. "Absolutely not," Khan said. "Okay well your track record seems to suggest otherwise," he answered.

Representative Darrell Issa, a Republican, sternly disagreed with the Khan FTC's decision to press on with a fight against Illumina's purchase of Grail after an FTC internal judge disagreed with FTC commissioners. That challenge was initially brought under the Trump administration and is currently before an appeals court. The agency also lost a fight to stop Facebook parent Meta Platforms from buying VR content maker Within Unlimited. Democrats on the committee sought to defend Khan, occasionally joined by Republicans on the panel including Rep. Ken Buck. The White House also put out a statement backing Khan. "Chair Khan has delivered results for families, consumers, workers, small businesses, and entrepreneurs," said White House Press Secretary Michael Kikukawa, citing efforts including the agency's bid to ban non-compete agreements and mergers that would harm consumers.

According to a recent Pew Research Center survey, the majority of Americans (59%) say TikTok is a threat to the national security of the United States. Variety reports: The findings from Pew Research Center's survey of U.S. adults come as TikTok, the popular short-form video app owned by Chinese internet conglomerate ByteDance, continues to be targeted by American lawmakers wary over its ties to China and how TikTok handles user data. Just 17% of Americans say the platform is not a threat to national security, while 23% say they are unsure, per the Pew survey.

Opinions about the national security threat posed by TikTok differ by political affiliation and age. Roughly 70% of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents say TikTok is either a minor or major threat to national security in the U.S., compared with 53% of Democrats and Democratic leaners. The perception of TikTok as a threat also varies by age: Just 13% of adults 18-29 say TikTok is a "major" threat; that rises to 24% among those 30-49, 35% among those 50-64; and 46% among Americans 65 and older.

Not surprisingly, adults who do not use TikTok are more likely than those who do to consider it a national security risk. Among non-users, 65% say the app is a security threat, including 36% who view it as a major threat. Among TikTok users, just 9% see it as a major threat and about one-third say it's a minor threat. The Pew survey was conducted May 15-21, 2023. [...] A survey Pew Research Center conducted in March found that 50% of Americans support a U.S. government ban on TikTok, while 22% were opposed and 28% were unsure.

Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers has used his partial veto power to make a creative line-item change to the state budget, securing increased funding for public schools until 2425 instead of 2025. The BBC reports: Republicans have reacted with fury to what they call "an unprecedented brand-new way to screw the taxpayer." The move could however be undone by a legal challenge or future governor. It is the latest tussle between Mr Evers, a former public school teacher who narrowly won re-election last year, and a Republican-controlled state legislature that has often blocked his agenda. Their original budget proposal had raised the amount local school districts could generate via property taxes, by $325 per student, for the next two school years.

But Wisconsin allows its governors to alter certain pieces of legislation by striking words and numbers as they see fit before signing them into law - what is known as partial veto power. Both Democrats and Republicans have flexed their partial veto authority for years, with Mr Evers' Republican predecessor once deploying it to extend a state program's deadline by one thousand years.

This week, before he signed the biennial state budget into law, the governor altered language that applied the $325 increase to the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years, vetoing a hyphen and a "20" to instead make the end date 2425. He also used his power to remove proposed tax cuts for the state's wealthiest taxpayers and protect some 180 diversity, equity and inclusion jobs Republicans wanted to cut at the public University of Wisconsin.

After a three-year pause, U.S. student loan repayments are set to resume on October 1st — just three months from today. But CNN reports that yesterday America's Supreme Court "struck down President Joe Biden's student loan forgiveness program, blocking millions of borrowers from receiving up to $20,000 in federal student debt relief."

"The court's 6 to 3 conservative majority held that the secretary of education did not have that authority under existing law," writes the Washington Post. The Guardian quotes President Biden's response: "I think the court misinterpreted the constitution."

CNN reports: No debt had been canceled, even though the Biden administration had received about 26 million applications for relief last year and approved 16 million of them. The forgiveness program, estimated to cost $400 billion, would have fulfilled a campaign promise of Biden's to cancel some student loan debt. But a group of Republican-led states and other conservative groups took the administration to court over the program, claiming that the executive branch does not have the power to so broadly cancel student debt in the proposed manner.

Critics also point out that the one-time student loan forgiveness program does nothing to address the cost of college for future students and could even lead to an increase in tuition. Some Democrats joined Republicans in voting for a bill to block the program. Both the Senate and the House passed the measure, but Biden vetoed the bill in early June...

The administration estimated that roughly 20 million borrowers would have seen their entire federal student loan balance wiped away.
UPDATE: CNBC reports the administration hasn't given up: President Joe Biden suggested on Friday that he was looking for another avenue to deliver student debt relief after the Supreme Court rejected his forgiveness plan.

"Today's decision has closed one path," Biden said during a briefing Friday. "Now we're going to pursue another."
A statement from the White House also points to other relief policies for students, noting for example that now "no one with an undergraduate loan has to pay more than 5 percent of their discretionary income." CNN reports: New rules set to take effect in July could broaden eligibility for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, which is aimed at helping government and nonprofit workers. And a new income-driven repayment plan proposal is meant to lower eligible borrowers' monthly payments and reduce the amount they pay back over time. The administration said this plan was finalized Friday and borrowers will be able to take advantage of it this summer, before loan payments are due. The Department of Education has also made it easier for borrowers who were misled by their for-profit college to apply for student loan forgiveness under a program known as borrower defense to repayment, as well as for those who are permanently disabled. Altogether, the Biden administration has approved more than $66 billion in targeted loan relief to nearly 2.2 million borrowers....

[T]he Biden administration said Friday that it will provide a 12-month on-ramp period for borrowers reentering payment... Borrowers will not be reported to credit bureaus, be considered in default or referred to collection agencies for late, missed or partial payments during the on-ramp period, according to a fact sheet from the White House.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: U.S. senators on Thursday introduced two separate bipartisan artificial intelligence bills on Thursday amid growing interest in addressing issues surrounding the technology. One would require the U.S. government to be transparent when using AI to interact with people and another would establish an office to determine if the United States is remaining competitive in the latest technologies. Senators Gary Peters, a Democrat who chairs the Homeland Security committee, introduced a bill along with Senators Mike Braun and James Lankford, both Republicans, which would require U.S. government agencies to tell people when the agency is using AI to interact with them. The bill also requires agencies to create a way for people to appeal any decisions made by AI.

"The federal government needs to be proactive and transparent with AI utilization and ensure that decisions aren't being made without humans in the driver's seat," said Braun in a statement. Senators Michael Bennet and Mark Warner, both Democrats, introduced a measure along with Republican Senator Todd Young that would establish an Office of Global Competition Analysis that would seek to ensure that the United States stayed in the front of the pack in developing artificial intelligence. "We cannot afford to lose our competitive edge in strategic technologies like semiconductors, quantum computing, and artificial intelligence to competitors like China," Bennet said.

Earlier this week, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said he had scheduled three briefings for senators on artificial intelligence, including the first classified briefing on the topic so lawmakers can be educated on the issue. The briefings include a general overview on AI, examining how to achieve American leadership on AI and a classified session on defense and intelligence issues and implications. Further reading: Ask Slashdot: What Are Some Good AI Regulations?

President Joe Biden moved to lock in his first Democratic majority at the Federal Communications Commission, naming veteran government lawyer Anna Gomez to an open seat and proposing to extend the service of two current commissioners. From a report: The appointments poise the FCC, after more than two years of partisan deadlock under a Democratic chairwoman, to act on the party's priorities, including restoring net neutrality regulations. Such rules bar broadband providers from interfering with web traffic and were gutted by Republicans during the administration of President Donald Trump.

All three nominees, announced by the White House on Monday, need Senate confirmation. In addition to Gomez, Biden proposed a second five-year term for Democrat Geoffrey Starks, who otherwise would need to leave the agency at the end of the year. Biden also proposed another term for Republican Brendan Carr, who has been on the commission since 2017. Gomez's arrival would bring the agency to its full strength of five commissioners for the first time since January 2021, when Trump's Republican chairman departed, leaving the 2-to-2 split. An earlier Biden nominee withdrew amid opposition from Senate Republicans. FCC commissioners serve staggered five-year terms, and no more than three can be members of the president's party.

President Joe Biden intends to select veteran government lawyer Anna Gomez to serve on the Federal Communications Commission and give the agency its first Democratic majority of his presidency, Bloomberg reported Thursday, citing a person briefed on the matter. From the report: Gomez's arrival would poise the FCC, after more than two years of partisan deadlock, to act on matters including restoring net neutrality rules that bar broadband providers from interfering with web traffic. Gomez's selection may be announced soon, said the person briefed on the matter, who declined to be identified because the matter hasn't been made public. The FCC has been split 2-to-2 along party lines since Biden's inauguration in 2021. An earlier nominee withdrew amid opposition from Senate Republicans. Gomez, with a long resume of Washington jobs including private law practice and work at two agencies, needs to win confirmation from the Senate where Democrats wield a narrow majority. Democrats including FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel have said they support restoring net neutrality rules that bar broadband providers from unfairly manipulating web traffic. The FCC under Republican leadership in 2017 gutted rules adopted earlier by the agency.

The Biden administration is considering creating a government-run alternative to TurboTax and H&R Block, drawing resistance from Republicans and companies fearing a loss of business. From a report: Democrats and consumer advocates have been pushing for the Internal Revenue Service to offer free online tax filing on its website, particularly for people with straightforward returns. Their core argument: Tax-preparation companies charge middle-income Americans for what advocates think should be a free public service.

The companies, meanwhile, are boosting lobbying spending and leaning on lawmakers to fight a change that could shrink their revenue, and they are emphasizing free options already available for taxpayers. They see the changes under consideration as a first step toward an even bigger threat in which the IRS could use information it gets from employers and other sources to prepare a first draft of taxpayers' returns for them. The IRS is due to release a report this week on a possible Direct File system -- think TurboTax but on the agency's website -- and the Biden administration will then decide whether to pursue it.