President Joe Biden touted the administration's economic achievements in a Virginia speech, while bashing Republicans for their handling of the nation's debt ceiling.
The Thursday speech followed the release of the latest Gross Domestic Product (GDP) numbers showing the U.S. economy expanded at a 2.9 percent annual pace in the last quarter, from October to December, slightly better than expected.
"I'm not sure the news could have been better. Economic growth is up, stronger than experts expected," Biden said of the report. "Jobs are the highest in American history. And wages are up, and they're going faster than inflation."
"Over the past six months, inflation has gone down every month, and God willing, we'll continue to do that," Biden said.
The President also took the opportunity to criticize the opposition party for its position on the debt ceiling. Republicans have said they would be willing to raise the nation's debt limit in exchange for spending cuts. But Democrats led by President Biden have maintained they would not make this sort of concession.
"I will not let anyone use the full faith and credit of the United States as a bargaining chip," President Biden said in his speech."I'm not going to get into the reckless threats that take the economy hostage in order to force an agenda that's going to only limit American workers and weaken us internationally."
"I won't let that happen," Biden added.
The Treasury Department implemented extraordinary measures after the U.S. hit its debt limit last Thursday. Those measures are expected to last only until June, at which point Congress will have had to act to avoid a default.
President Donald Trump has signed an executive order to block states from regulating artificial intelligence. He argues that heavy regulations could stifle the industry, especially given competition from China. Trump says the U.S. needs a unified approach to AI regulation to avoid complications from state-by-state rules. The order directs the administration to draw up a list of problematic regulations for the Attorney General to challenge. States with laws could lose access to broadband funding, according to the text of the order. Some states have already passed AI laws focusing on transparency and limiting data collection.
The New York Times and President Donald Trump are fighting again. The news outlet said Wednesday it won't be deterred by Trump's “false and inflammatory language” from writing about the 79-year-old president's health. The Times has done a handful of stories on that topic recently, including an opinion column that said Trump is “starting to give President Joe Biden vibes.” In a Truth Social post, Trump said it might be treasonous for outlets like the Times to do “FAKE” reports about his health and "we should do something about it.” The Republican president already has a pending lawsuit against the newspaper for its past reports on his finances.
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President Donald Trump says a deal struck by Netflix last week to buy Warner Bros. Discovery “could be a problem” because of the size of the combined market share. The Republican president says he will be involved in the decision about whether federal regulators should approve the deal. Trump commented Sunday when he was asked about the deal as he walked the red carpet at the Kennedy Center Honors. The $72 billion deal would bring together two of the biggest players in television and film and potentially reshape the entertainment industry.
The two-sentence footnote raised serious concerns about accuracy and credibility.
